The True Horror of Konoha (Rewrite)
by jinx777
Summary: Something happened to Naruto on his seventh birthday that was so bad it broke him. The Sandaime Hokage had to put him in confinement for the safety of the village. But five years later, things come to light and Hiruzen wonders if he made a mistake. Slightly insane/not evil Naruto.
1. The Breaking Point

_**VERY**_**IMPORTANT AN!**

**Ok so long story short it's been a while since I had any inspiration for 'The True Horror of Konoha', and after trying to reread it I have found that I don't like the way it was written. It is for that reason that I have decided to rewrite it.**

**Now before I get people filling my PM box I will explain a few things.**

**While I say rewrite for the most part I don't intend to change that much of the actual story, though there will probably be a few things different, all I want to do is try and write what is already here a bit better so that I can actually reread it (something that I honestly haven't been able to do, I know how stupid that sounds but that just how it is). One of the things I will be doing is joining some of the chapters together so that they are longer.**

**Hopefully it won't take long to do this because I will be using my original chapters as templates and when I have finished redoing them all I will write a new one :)**

_**VERY**_**IMPORTANT AN!**

**For anyone reading this for the first time I will warn you now that this first chapter will be **_**very **_**graphic. Later chapters will have humour but this first chapter in particular will be very violent and may disturb people.**

**You have been warned, this fic is rated M for a reason, mainly this first chapter.**

**One last thing before you start reading, I am looking for someone that will be willing to Beta for this fic, I never got one for the original and think it would be a good idea. So if your interested please PM me :)**

XXX

**Disclaimer- I own nothing**:(

XXX

Chapter 1- The Breaking Point

Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Sandaime Hokage of Konoha, was _not_happy. He should have known that something would happen, it always did, but on this particular day of the year it was always the worst. He should have known better then to trust the civilian council, but he was old and tired, truth be told he should have retired years ago. The problem with that is that there was no one to replace him, at least not one he would trust the safety of the village to.

There was his old friend Danzo, smart, organized and strong in his own right, but he was a war hawk through and through. He didn't believe in true peace and to him ninja were little more than disposable weapons that were to be used and replaced. Hatake Kakashi could be an option in a few years, but only if he could learn to let go of the past and move on with his life. Tsunade had a similar problem to Kakashi along with a drinking and gambling addiction and as for Jiraiya... well let's not go there.

At this moment in time the old Hokage was making his way down the hospital corridor to a special room set aside for when something like this happened (which unfortunately was quite often) nurses and doctors alike were being brought to their knees at his barely contained killing intent. He could feel his temper rise more and more at the thought of what had happened, but more importantly at the fact he had let it.

**Flashback**

Sarutobi was bored; there was no other way to describe it. He sat in yet another pointless council meeting that seemed to have nothing to do with him (or any of the other clans of Konoha for that matter) as they were forced to listen to the current spokesmen of the civilian council; a large, overweight man with greasy black hair and expensive clothes which seemed to be dripping with sweat at the effort of standing up while talking.

All they had been talking about up to this point were civilian affairs, which had nothing to do with shinobi. He looked around at all the people present, the civilian council, thirty of the most annoying people in the world that just seemed to blend into each other nothing extraordinary about any of them except the clothes they wore.

The shinobi council however was a different story, made up of all the clan heads of Konoha: the Aburame, Akimichi, Hyuuga, Inuzuka, Nara, Yamanaka, and of course his own the Sarutobi clan; they made an interesting group of people that stood out in any crowd.

Then there were the village elders, Homura, Koharu and Danzo, his old teammates and former best friend. Over the years they had become more and more distant until it got to the point they hardly ever said more than a few words to each other unless it was business. He felt a pang of regret for that. They used to be the best of friends, but now it was like they were little more than strangers.

It was while he was reminiscing about his old friends that he noticed for the first time that all of the civilian council seemed nervous. He picked up all the little things; the way that some of them kept looking from the clock to him, the nervous whispers between two or three council members and the fact that they all seemed to be sweating. His warning bell was screaming, something was wrong terribly wrong.

Then it hit him.

Without warning the room was suddenly flooded with killing intent, all in the room falling silent as all eyes shot to the old Hokage in fear. His killing intent seemed to become visible as a dark aura surrounded him, the very air growing think and hard to breathe. The tension in the room kept rising until slowly, Sarutobi started to stand up. He kept his head lowered, the Hokage hat casting a shadow, hiding his eyes from view.

"_What have you done_?"

His voice as barely above a whisper, yet in the silence that had settled in the room it might as well have been screamed. He watched as most of the civilian council flinched at the question, all doing their best to avoid eye contact with the enraged Hokage. The room was completely silent, nobody wanting to be the first to break and risk the wrath of the man that could without a doubt kill all of them with minimal effort.

Surprisingly it was a member of the civilian council that broke the silence. He looked like any other middle-aged civilian; short brown hair, brown eyes and dressed in a simple, yet expensive, grey kimono. He stood up slowly, as if he was scared of making any sudden movements as the eyes of the room moved from the still enraged Sarutobi to him.

"W-what d-do y-you mean, H-Hokage-s-sama?"

He stuttered out, and by the end of his question he was shaking.

"...did you really think I wouldn't notice? Did you think I wouldn't realize that something was going on? I may be old, but I am not senile yet. Now, tell me. _**What have you done**_!"

By the end of his speech, he had gone from a soft whisper to shouting, the walls themselves shaking at the uncontrolled rage in his voice. Slowly he moved so he stood in front on his desk, not raising his head to look at the terrified men and women in their seats; his eyes hidden in the shadows of his Hokage hat.

Homura, Koharu and Danzo all looked at their old friend in both fear and surprise; it had been many years since they had seen Hiruzen with such a commanding presence. But what many if they were looking at the elders instead of the Hokage, would have been shocked to see was the barely restrained _hope _in their eye.

Finally, after a few more minutes silence, Koharu spoke.

"Hiruzen, what's wrong?"

It was at this point that Sarutobi finally lifted his head so that all present could see his eyes. They were not the soft, caring eyes of the old man that so many had come to know. They were as hard as steel, the pupils of his eyes shrunken in anger. These were the eyes of someone that had seen battle, that had witnessed the lives of countless people end, both friend and foe. These were the eyes of the God of Shinobi, the eyes of The Professor, one of the most feared ninja to ever walk the elemental nations. At this point in time, his eyes were fixed firmly on the members of the civilian council.

His voice as cold as ice, Sarutobi spoke.

"Why are we here, why are any of us here? These aren't shinobi matters, so far all we've heard s nothing that couldn't wait until the next official council meeting. So, _why are we here_? I was told that there was an important matter that must be discussed and yet we have been here for four hours and all you have talked about is basic information of no real importance. So I ask you, why_are we here_?"

Again, nobody spoke, nobody moved, the tension in the room becoming more and more intense with every passing minute as the civilians got more and more nervous at each word that came from the elderly Hokage's mouth.

It was then that he asked a question that had a unique effect on the room.

"What is the date?"

Those four words froze all those in the room, the civilians in fear and the shinobi in sudden realization. Everything was quiet. Then the killing intent in the room seemed to increase tenfold. All the shinobi clan heads and, surprisingly, the three elders added their own killing intent to the Hokage's.

Suddenly, not being able to stand the killing intent in the room any longer, one of the civilians stood from her seat to address the gathered people; a woman in her late twenty's, with black hair and an expensive looking white kimono with the image of a sakura tree in bloom. The fear she was felt at the combined killing intent making her voice come out high and shaky.

"**We did what you were afraid to do! The Kyuubi is dead and all the people it killed that night have been avenged and- !"**

It was then that a VERY pissed Inuzuka Tsume shot to her feet practical frothing at the mouth, along with every other clan head in the room. The killing intent reaching a new high, the women couldn't bare it and was forced back into her sea, face pale and eyes wide in unbridled fear.

"You fools are you so blinded by your hate that you actually believe that a _seven-year-old _boy is the Kyuubi! Did it ever occur to any of you that if that was true we'd all be dead by now!"

Despite what many would believe, many of the shinobi in Konoha didn't hold a grudge against the boy. Some did, mostly those that lost everything in the attack seven years ago, but most didn't act on this hate beyond glares and harsh words and even then those were few and far in between. Every now and then they would join in with the civilian if there was a mob, but they weren't ninja for long after that.

Before anything else could happen, Nara Shikaku started moving; a rare, serious expression on his usually bored face as he made his way to the door, not even sparring a glance at the civilians as he passed them.

"We don't have time for this, we need to try and stop whatever is happening before it's too late."

That was all it took to snap the attention of the people in the room as the clan heads, elders and Sarutobi all quickly moved to the doors, but before the Hokage pushed the doors open, he paused; looking back at the members of the civilian council left them with one more thing to think about.

"If anything has happened to Naruto, anything at all, I will come back here and kill every single one of you. ANBU! Make sure none of them leave this room before I come back."

Five animal masked ninja appeared in the room, positioning themselves in such a way that any and all possible exits were blocked off. With that he pushed the doors open.

Only to stop dead at the sound that assaulted his ears. He absently made a mental note that someone must have applied a silencing seal to the door and windows while they were in the room. It was the only way to explain why none of them had heard the bone chilling scream that seemed to echo across the entire village.

**End flashback**

When Sarutobi had finally arrived at the room he stopped at the door and just stood there for a moment. He wasn't sure if he could go in, from what he saw when they got to the scene he knew it would be bad. It was a miracle, depending on your definition of the word, that he was even alive. He was stood there for several minutes until finally, after taking a deep breath to help steel his nerves; he pushed the sliding door open. His breath hitched at the sight before him.

A small, severely malnourished, seven-year-old boy was hooked up to several different machines, lying on a hospital bed that made him look smaller than he was. His body was covered from head to toe in bandages; the only parts left visible being his eyes.

Walking into the room, Sarutobi sat in the single chair set next to the bed. As he looked at the boy he couldn't stop the tears falling down his fact; in a matter of seconds the old Hokage seemed to grow ten years older.

"I'm so sorry Naruto, if only I had realized what was going on sooner... I could have stopped this. You should never have had to go through that... no one should."

By the time the old shinobi had gotten over his shock he and the others were too late. They found the young boy in the middle of a large crowd, tied to a log in the centre of a bonfire. Every now and then someone would throw more wood onto the fire, or the occasional bottle at the screaming boy.

What really got to the group that had just arrived on the scene was that the boy seemed to be healing at the same rate he was burning. Whatever clothes he had been wearing were burned away long ago, giving a clear view of the young child's skin as it sizzled away before growing back almost instantly. Then they noticed something that really made them sick. He was still conscious, screaming.

And those people stood there, laughing and cheering.

After slaughtering people in the crowd in a blind rage and sending whoever was left to Ibiki, they had quickly rushed the boy to the hospital. That was twelve hours ago, and in that time they had found out a lot about what had happened. It seemed that the civilian council had managed to round up a small number of his ninja to help them in their vendetta against the boy and as soon as the meeting was underway they had applied a silencing seal to the door.

They had surprised the ANBU guarding him and knocked him out before moving on and dragging the poor boy out of his apartment. The mob had then proceeded to beat Naruto to within an inch of his life, before letting him heal, only to do it again. When they had their fill of beating the poor boy they tied him to the post and after some big speech from one Miss Haruno, that included telling the barely conscious Naruto that the Kyuubi was sealed inside him, they had lit the fire.

The worst part by far was the fact that he had been burning for three hours straight, the Kyuubi trying to heal its prison in an attempted to live and, unfortunately, keeping him conscious for the entire experience; it seemed that even the great Kyuubi no Kitsune couldn't heal everything.

According to the doctors Naruto had suffered third degree burns over his entire body and it seemed that, even though it was healing... there was nothing more they could do for him.

His body would never be free of the scars.

XXX

**16 hours earlier**

XXX

Naruto was sat on his bed in his apartment, staring at the floor with a blankly. Today was his seventh birthday and, like all his previous birthdays, he was spending it completely alone.

His apartment was made up of just two rooms, the main room, which had his bed, a table and a small kitchen he didn't know how to use; the once white wallpaper was peeling off, creaks covering most of it and the carpet was covered in strange reddish- brown stains from all the times the villagers had come and beat him. There was one window that looked out onto the street, but had several cracks and missing pieces of glass from where people had thrown rocks into his room.

The only other room was what the old man said was supposed to be his bathroom. It did have all the basic things that one would find in a bathroom, a toilet, a sink, it even had a shower. The problem however was that he never had any hot water, so whenever he took one it hurt because it was so cold.

He also learned that before he moved in someone, (probably his landlord) after hearing that he was moving in had disconnected the water pipe that went to the toilet. This meant that he needed to put water in it himself when he wanted to flush. The problem with that however was that he could barely reach the top of the toilet.

He looked around his small apartment, he was lucky the old man could get him it really. Sure it was small, but it's not like he had much stuff anyway and the stuff he did have was old and, in most cases, mouldy, it was still better then when he was living on the streets.

Three years ago, on his fourth birthday, the orphanage had told him that they didn't have room for him anymore and through him out, literally. One of the care workers had thrown him out by the scruff of his neck right into a pile of rubbish. The first few weeks had been hard, but he soon learned which bins would have food and which alleys would have boxes that he could sleep in.

Then the villages had found him. That was when the beatings had started.

Luckily, the old man had found him. He didn't trust him at first, it wasn't the first time someone had tricked him, but over time his weariness of the kind old man in the strange clothes eased away. Sarutobi had been careful when he saw him, shocked as well. But after getting over it he took a shivering Naruto to the hospital and, after getting him looked at, brought him here.

He could remember once how a 'nice' old lady had invited him into her house to eat when she found him looking through her bins for food. The moment he was in she locked the door and proceeded to beat him with her walking stick, screaming something about how he had 'killed her only son'. Only after about ten minutes of cowering on the ground as she continued to beat him was Naruto was finally able to get away from her by jumping through a window.

It was also the first time he noticed that he healed _very _fast. When he had gotten far enough away he had stopped and looked at his arms, which were filled with shards of broken glass from the window he had leapt through in his desperation to get away. Then, right in front of his eyes, the glass was pushed out of his skin and the wounds started to heal. He didn't know what to think, but just assumed that it was the same for everyone and, putting it to the back of his mind, didn't think about it again.

That was about a year ago and since then he never left the apartment, at least not willingly. All his food was brought to him so he never needed to. Not that it stop the villagers.

The old man would visit him every now and then, but he hadn't had time as of late. Naruto didn't know what he actually did but he knew it was important.

Lost in his thoughts he didn't even realize that he started singing to himself, his small, weak voice barely above a whisper.

"Happy...Birthday...to me...happy... birthday... to me... happy birthday... Naruto...happy...birthday...to...me..."

By the end of the song Naruto could feel the tears falling down his cheeks, but he still didn't make another sound. He just started off into empty space, twin lines of water falling freely from his eyes.

_Why?_

Why did he have to be alone?

_Why?_

Why did the villages hate him?

_Why?_

Why did they hurt him?

"Why...why...why...**WHY**!"

As he asked himself these question again and again Naruto barely even registered he had started to punch the wall next to his bed, his small hands bleeding as the skin split and the ones creaked, only to heal moments later.

Not being able to take it anymore he threw himself on his bed and sobbed into the bare mattress.

XXX

Meanwhile, ANBU captain, Hatake Kakashi was looking through the window from his perch on the building across the street from the small boy's apartment. He watched a seven year old boy sang to himself as he cried, as he punched a wall over and over again until his hand broke.

His hart ached at the sight. No one should have to go through what he had, and defiantly not a young boy.

Kakashi had been the boys guard ever since the Hokage had found him in a back alley, half frozen from the cold and little more than bones. It was a miracle he was alive. When he had first seen the boy in the hospital the silver haired Jonin thought he was actually dead and, after spending about an hour just staring at his weak form, the Hokage had called him straight to his office and told him what had happened.

Originally he had wanted to adopt him, but the council argued that because he was an ANBU captain, 'a job far more important to the village then looking after one brat' as they put it, he was refused; because his parental status as being the son of a ninja, let alone the Fourths, was an S–rank secret, he fell under the jurisdiction of the civilian council.

So instead he had volunteered to be the boy's bodyguard, a job the Hokage had agreed to but had to set certain rules. The boy was still a civilian after all so he couldn't officially be given a guard. So they had come up with a solution.

Kakashi spent almost all his spare time watching the boy; if he wasn't on a mission then he was on the roof across from Naruto's apartment. This meant he could stop anyone that tried going after the boy while he was here. The only problem with this was that he still needed to go on missions so nobody would realize that the boy actually had protection and not just a passing ANBU.

Kakashi knew who the boy's parents were. Really you would need to be completely blind not to, he had his mother's last name for a start and as for his father, well just look at him, he was a carbon copy of the Fourth Hokage. The only difference between the two was the skinny frame and whisker marks on his cheeks.

So caught up in his thoughts Kakashi didn't notice the black clad figure behind him and by the time he did it was too late. Kakashi felt a sharp pain in the back of his head, and then nothing.

XXX

After an hour or so of crying Naruto had finally fallen asleep, his dreams full of faceless people, villagers. There was all one thing they all had in common; they hurt him.

His dreams were always the same, at least when he could get to sleep. It was very rare for Naruto to sleep more than an hour at a time. He didn't know why; he just didn't seem to really need it, his body was just full of energy.

But when he did it was always the same.

He would always have nightmares. Some of them, like the one he was having now, were just of all the times he was beaten by the villagers. Other he had nightmares of strange creatures, odd..._things_. Some of them didn't even seem to have a shape, nothing more than shades in the shadows of his dreams. Hiding at the edge of his mind...waiting...watching.

The thing that scared him the most though was when he had a dream about _it. _He didn't know why but it was always the clearest thing in his nightmares and it was the one thing that was always there. Whenever he slept, no matter what he was dreaming, it would always make an appearance.

A large fox, bigger than any building he had seen in Konoha, bigger even then the Hokage monument. With its blood red fur and teeth larger than a full grown man, it was the most frightening thing he had ever seen. But the most terrifying thing about it was the eyes. Large red pools of moving liquid fire ringed in black, with a black vertical slit down the middle. It was like the two colours were fighting for dominance, a never ending battle between light and dark.

It was the eyes that haunted Naruto in his waking hours, they held no real emotion. No malice, no happiness, nothing, just a primal instinct, primal need, yet they shone with an odd intellect. It was like the fox was both a beast yet intelligent at the same time.

XXX

Naruto was woken when he heard loud banging at his door. Instantly he knew what was going on, it happened all the time. Sitting up in his bed he just stared at the door...waiting. He knew from experience that there was no point in hiding, they always found him.

It didn't take them long to get through the door, when they did Naruto saw a large number of people crowded in the corridor outside his room. He recognized some of them from previous mobs, the middle age fat man that had no hair, the old man with the long white beard and one eye.

And then there was the woman with the pink hair, she was a regular when it came to his mobs, hell most the time she was the leader. With her pink hair and green eyes she normally stood out in a crowd. She had on an elegant red dress with a strange white pattern and looked like she was going out on a night in the town, not leading a mob to a small boy. They just stood there in the doorway for a moment; the pink haired lady had a smug look on her face, just staring at him.

"Take it outside."

Her voice was cold and without sparring him a second glance, turned around and went to wait outside. With those three words she had broken the flood gates. The men lurched forward and roughly grabbed the seven year old. Naruto could smell the alcohol on their breath, that was bad, it was always worse when they were drunk. After they dragged him outside Naruto saw more people. This was _very _bad, there had never been this many people before.

For the next half hour the mob proceeded to beat, stab, and bludgeon the small boy until it seemed there was nothing left to hurt. Even through the pain Naruto found himself making mental notes of what was happening.

He was stabbed more times than he could count, but that wasn't saying much considering he was never taught past ten. He was bludgeoned with lead pipes, run through with farm equipment, kicked, punched, and slashed. Throughout the whole experience, Naruto never made a sound, not even to scream. He wouldn't give them the satisfaction.

This just seemed to make them angrier, but as soon as they stopped he started to heal and it would start all over again. He didn't know how long they beat him, it could have been hours or minutes for all he knew. Every time Naruto reached his limit they would stop, wait for a few minutes for him to heal, and then start again.

Eventually the pink haired woman came back into view, though it took him a few minutes to identify her because his eyes need to re-grow after they were stabbed and pulled out for the fifth time, not that Naruto knew they were doing this, as far as he knew he had just lost conciseness for a few minutes.

"Tie him to the post."

Naruto was hurled up and dragged to a post someone had stuck to the ground, a pile of wood lying around the base. Now, Naruto might be young but even he could see what was going to happen. If he could have put up a fight as they tied him to the post he would, but he was still healing.

When he was secured to the post with ninja wire the mob moved back and five people clad in black hoods, stopping anyone from seeing their faces; stepped out of the crowd and stood there, surrounding the unlit pile of wood.

When the crowd had quieted down the pink haired woman stepped forward and starred at him with an empty expression on her face. After a minute of looking into his eyes she smirked, her eyes becoming filled with sick glee and turned to address the crowd.

"Tonight, we right the wrongs that have been done to us! Tonight, we take are revenge on this..._creature_!"

At this point she throws her right arm out towards Naruto. The crowd began to cheer as her words got more and more heated. Someone in the crowd got so worked up by this that they through an empty sake bottle at the beaten boy. After waiting for the crowd to settle down again she continued.

"Seven years ago, the Kyuubi attacked this village, destroyed our homes and killed are families! Tonight we take our revenge! This thing has the Kyuubi inside it, therefore it is the Kyuubi! The Hokage may be fooled by its facade, but we are **not**! We see it for what it truly is and tonight we finish what the Fourth could not! Tonight, **we kill theKyuubi no Kitsune**!"

At the end of her tirade she turned to look at the boy, her face full of arrogance and self-importance.

Naruto was shocked, he didn't understand, he was the Kyuubi? That was impossible, wasn't it? His thoughts flashed to his nightmares, to a giant red fox. What if it was true? What if he was the Kyuubi? It made sense, the glares, the beating, the hate; it was all because he was the Kyuubi.

If he was the Kyuubi why didn't he remember? If he had killed all those people he would remember, wouldn't he? All these thoughts and more passed through Naruto's head, but before he had time to think the pink haired lady raised her hands and looked at each of the five people around the fire.

"Light it up!"

With that the five hooded figures started to make hand seals. When they finished five voices could be heard calling out.

"**Fire Style: Grate Fire Ball"**

Five balls of fire simultaneously struck the wood, and lit it instantly. It didn't take long for the heat to get to be too much for Naruto. He tried not to scream, to keep to his personal vow of silence, but he just couldn't. The pain was too much for him to bear and with one deep breath...

...he let it out.

All these years of pain that these people caused him, all the things they had done...he just let it all out.

He screamed...he screamed so loud that it actually made them stop cheering for a moment, but the moment passed, and they started again. Soon he started to feel his skin bubble, melting off his body. It was indescribable; he was in so much pain. Then he noticed in his pain fogged mind that he was healing _while _he was burning. For three hours he screamed, but to him it seemed like a life time, a life time of burning, writhing in agony...nothing but him, the flames and the sound of laughter over his own screams.

At some point in time he felt the fire stop, but that just caused a new pain to arrive, he felt...cold, very cold. He had become so used to the heat that he couldn't stop shivering and the more he shivered the more it hurt. The last thing he saw before he was finally able to slip into the abyss that was his mind was the old man, looking down on him with a look of absolute horror on his face.

XXX

When Naruto woke up he didn't know where he was, and he didn't care, there was no pain. He was numb; he felt nothing. He started to notice his surroundings, his head still a little foggy. Wherever he was, it was huge, some kind of underground cavern, solid stone walls all around him and a barely visible stone roof. To one side he noticed a giant gate in the place of a wall, but that wasn't what was weird about it. The strange thing was that it seemed to be held shut with nothing more than a piece of paper.

As he stood up he realized that he was knee deep in some kind of strange in water, which seemed to be flowing out from the cage. It took him a minute before he recognized that it wasn't water at all...it was blood.

And he still didn't care.

It was then that he heard it, a low rumbling sound off in the distance. At first he thought it was thunder, but then remembered he was underground. Whatever it was, it was getting louder. Turning towards the gate he grasped what he was hearing.

Growling.

How did he figure that out; by looking at the giant red fox on the other side of the gate.

He stared up into its face, into its fire like eyes, the eyes that had haunted his nightmares for as long as he could remember. For the first time they didn't scare him, he felt empty... numb.

The two just stared at each other for what felt like hours, until finally.

"**HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA"**

It was strange to see a fox laugh; its voice was so deep he could feel the vibrations all around him.

"**I have lived for thousands of years, seen civilizations rise and fall, but I have never known a human, a child no less that could look me in the eye without fear. Maybe you won't be such a bad host after all. Hahahahaha!"**

Naruto just continued to look at the giant beast before him with a blank expression on his seven year old face, showing no sign that he had even heard nor cared the fox's words.

"...So it's true. You being here must mean the things the pink haired lady said were true. Though I can't tell where we are, it does seem oddly familiar..."

His words made the fox's laughter stop instantly, a look of mild surprise crossing its face. The boy's voice just sounded...wrong, it held no emotion, no feeling. It actually sent a shiver up the Kyuubi's spine to hear such an empty tone in a child's voice. It was then the fox took a good look at the boy.

He had a plain white t-shirt with that looked like it had come right out of the trash, a pair of black shorts with too many holes in them to be considered usable. His spiky blonde hair going in all directions, and three whiskers on each cheek gave him an innocent look, not that it had helped him with the villagers. But what really caught its attention were his eyes, large blue eyes that were normally full of life; no matter what happened, eyes that would brighten up the room just by being there, were now dead.

They held no light in them, no shine of happiness, no flash of anger...nothing. They lacked the spark that one would see in the eyes of the living. Now they were like the eyes of an old man that had seen too much and had given up, waiting for death to come and take him away.

The Kyuubi didn't know what to think of this. It had never seen eyes like that, especially not in the eyes of a seven year old boy.

"**...We are in your Mindscape, a place in your subconscious mind. At the moment we are using it a...well you could say a bridge of sorts, in order for us to communicate. What you see around you is a representation of both our minds."**

Naruto thought about that for a moment, seeming to be getting his thoughts in order as he took his time looking around him.

"I see, I'm guessing the blood is you, which means that my mind is... a sewer? Hm..."

That made the fox laugh again, it was starting to actually like this kid.

XXX

Sarutobi Hiruzen had been sitting at Naruto's bedside for three days straight; luckily, his old friends had stepped up to run the village for a few days. He had been skeptical at first of letting Danzo anywhere near his office, but it turns out he wasn't against him as much as he thought. He had been, in his own words 'trying to bring back his Will of Fire'.

It seems that he had taken it onto himself to try and challenge him, hopping that by going against what he believed in it would force him to regain the fire that he lost at the end of the Third Great War. Sarutobi had been so happy when he heard that, that he actually hugged the old cripple. Danzo still didn't agree with his ideals, but did admit that he respected them, even if he couldn't believe in them himself.

Homura and Koharu apparently knew about this from the start, but not having the heart to do the same, started to distance themselves from him, not being able to see him that way. When the three had seen the look in his eyes at the meeting they had seen their friend again, the man that had lived through wars and countless battles. They had come to him the same night of 'the incident', as it was now being called, and told him everything. Since then they had been handling everything while he waited for the boy in front of him to wake up.

They had caught most people from that night, at least the ones that were left after he went into that rage, but some had still gotten away. They had stopped four of the five ninja that had been involved and they had been nothing more than a few no-named chunin that had lost their families in the Kyuubi attack seven years ago. The rest that they had caught were just civilians, mostly drunk, and had all been sent to Ibiki and Anko.

Three days...

Three days, and there was still no response from Naruto, not a twitch or a groan, nothing.

He heard the door to the room sliding open and turned to see Hatake Kakashi entering the room.

XXX

Kakashi had been in a deep depression ever since 'the incident'. He wasn't wearing his ANBU uniform any more, only his normal attire of a black body suit, his mask, his flak jacket and his left eye covered by his forehead protector.

It was all his fault, if he had been paying attention this wouldn't have happened...and to have been jumped by some no-name chunin. If nothing else this whole experience had shown him that he had become arrogant, relying on the sharingan and letting his other skills fade which had left him vulnerable, and now Naruto was the one to pay the price.

By the time he had come too it was too late, the damage was done.

He had woken up just in time to see the Hokage go berserk, slaughtering many people gathered around the burning seven year old. He was found a few minutes later on the same roof he had been sat watching over Naruto with his hands tied in ninja wire by one of the ANBU that had been gathering up the few villagers that had gotten away.

After hearing what had happened, and a quick talk with the Hokage, he had come to the Memorial Stone, and just stood there, staring at the names of his old teammate, and sensei for three days.

"I'm so sorry Minato-sensei, Rin...Obito, I failed again."

He whispered to the air. He decided that it was time to see if Naruto was awake; turning his back to the stone, he took off towards the hospital.

XXX

The first thing Sarutobi thought when he saw Kakashi was that he looked even more tired than he did, the bags under his visible eye only seemed to emphasize this fact. His clothes were a mess, and his hair, which would usually be sticking up, was flat against his head. His shoulders were slumped towards the ground, he slowly walked in to the room, and stood next to the Hokage, looking at the boy lying in the bed.

"I don't blame you Kakashi, it wasn't your fault. They got around all of us and you couldn't have known other ninja were going to come."

The silver haired ninja didn't react to the Hokage's words; he just stood there, staring at Naruto. Eventually he replied, his voice barely above a whisper.

"I appreciate that Hokage-sama...but it _was _my fault. I let my guard down and he paid for it."

Sarutobi was afraid this would happen. "Kakashi they tricked us all, including me. At least we don't have to deal with those damn fools anymore."

It was true, while Naruto had been in surgery Sarutobi had gone back to the council room, and repeated what had happened when he had found Naruto. The only difference being that he killed them all. The village council now consisted of only the shinobi clans, at least until a civilian council could be selected.

Kakashi still didn't move his eyes from Naruto's form.

"...I guess..."

Before another word could be said between the two of them; one of the machines connected to Naruto started beeping rapidly. Startled, Sarutobi shot to his feet, and leaned over while Kakashi ran into the hall shouting for a doctor.

"Naruto? Naruto, can you hear me? Naruto?"

Slowly, the young boy's eyes started to open. When they did, Sarutobi's, Kakashi's and the just arriving doctor's eyes all widened in a mixture of horror and shock, all three of them taking a step back, not even realizing it. They were the eyes of a corpse, lifeless, without the slightest hint of emotion in his once bright blue eyes. They were still the same shade of blue, but something was just...missing.

"Dear Kami, Naruto...what have they done to you?" whispered Sarutobi under his breath.

Getting over his shock the doctor quickly made his way over to the boy's bedside and, after taking a moment to check the many different machines that he was hooked up to, shone a small light in his eyes to test their reaction, trying to figure out what was wrong with them. When that was done he stepped back, shook his head, and then turned to the other two men in the room.

"He's conscious, and there's nothing _physically _wrong with his eyes. I'm sorry there's nothing I can do at this point."

With that he left, leaving them men in the room with the poor boy.

A few minutes later Naruto started to whisper something; it was so quiet that the two shinobi in the room had to lean in towards the boy to hear him.

"Why...didn't you just let me die? Why?"

Those words broke both men's hearts, to hear such words coming from a seven-year-old boy was just wrong. Not able to stand it anymore, Kakashi left the room without a word, though the old Hokage could clearly hear the sound of something being thrown against a wall out in the corridor.

"_Probably going back to the memorial stone"_

Thought Sarutobi.

XXX

It was a week later before Naruto was discharged from the hospital. He didn't say a word to anyone, not even the Hokage after that first sentence, just staring off into empty space. It worried Sarutobi greatly. There was also the fact that he hadn't slept at all for a week straight, and didn't show any signs of changing that any time soon.

Kakashi hadn't come back.

As Sarutobi lead him to his apartment Naruto absently noticed that the people were still glaring at him whenever the old man wasn't looking. He was covered from head to toe in bandages again, although there was now an opening for his mouth and eyes. The old man had found him some basic clothes to wear on the way. Ironically, they were the same clothes he had when in his mindscape talking to Kyuubi, only new. Sarutobi had tried to talk to him about the Kyuubi several times, but Naruto would just stare off into space, not saying a word.

When they got to the apartment the old Hokage stayed with him for an hour or so, making sure the boy was ok. Naruto just went about his business as if he wasn't even there. Moving around the room, picking up the things that had been knocked over when the villagers had bragged him out, throwing away what they had broken.

"_At least one good thing came out of this."_

With the civilian council gone he was in charge of the village until a new council could be found.

Meaning, starting tomorrow night, Naruto would get a full ANBU guard watching over him 24/7. He had asked Kakashi to be the team leader, but the man had refused, saying that he couldn't look after him anymore when he let him down like that.

Eventually Sarutobi had to go back to work; he had been away for too long as it was, so saying goodbye to the unresponsive boy he left the apartment, shaking his head at the thought of what had happened to the boy.

XXX

As the day turned to night you could find Naruto in the same spot as the night when they had come for him, just sitting on his mattress staring into an empty corner of the room. He didn't know how long he had been sat there, and he didn't care.

It was at this point that his door opened, he hadn't locked it, he didn't see any point, it never stopped them before, and it wouldn't now. He just kept staring at the wall. After a few minutes of nothing happening he slowly turned his head toward the door, still showing no interest at what was going on around him.

Stood in the doorway, an insane grin stretching across her face was the pink haired lady. It seemed that she was one of the few that got away from the old man. For a few more minutes he just sat there, staring into her wide, deranged eyes. Then he saw the knife in her hand. It looked like a simple eight inch long kitchen knife, the same thing someone would use if they were preparing dinner.

"Why didn't you just die? It was all planned out; I was going to be the one to lead the people of Konoha to the destruction of the Kyuubi. I was going to be a hero, but you just wouldn't DIE!" Her voice was high, almost a screech, and as she was saying this she had moved further into the room. By the end of her speech, he made a mental note that she seemed to really like monologues for some reason; she had stopped right in front of Naruto, and stabbed the boy in the chest. He felt the pain as the blade pierced his skin, slipping through his ribs and puncturing his lung as a cold sensation started spreading around the wound; but Naruto didn't react at all, he didn't flinch, he didn't blink, he didn't even gasp. He just kept staring into her green eyes. This just made the woman angrier, so she kept stabbing, each time repeating the same word over and over again.

**"Die! Die! Die! Die! Die! Die! Die!"**

It was while she was stabbing him over and over that something inside Naruto just …snapped.

Before the woman could stab him again, he grabbed her by the wrist seizing the hand that held the knife, and with the same emotionless expression he had been wearing until to that point, broke it in one quick movement. She was in such shock that she stood there, staring at her wrist for a full minute before she started to scream.

Before she could get to a decent volume Naruto leapt from his mattress, and pushed her to the ground, placing a hand over her mouth to silence her. Slowly leaning down so that his mouth was right next to her ear, Naruto made the first sound he had in a week.

"Shush..."

When he pulled away again, his hand still placed firmly over her mouth, she looked up into the young boys eyes; what she saw made her stop struggling, and she froze in terror. His eyes weren't empty anymore, they were filled with an insane glee at what was about to happen.

Then he started to giggle, then chuckle, then laugh until it reached full blown hysterics. After about a minute of laughing, he stopped and once again leaned down so that he was next to her ear and said, in a voice so full of childlike innocence it made a cold shiver run don her spine...

"_Will you walk into my parlor?" said the Spider to the Fly_

And with those words, the small boy's body started to change before her eyes.

XXX

**Flashback**

XXX

Naruto just stared at the giant fox in front of him, his face completely devoid of any emotions as he met the beast's burning gaze without fear.

"Why?"

The fox just looked down at the boy in front of it with an amused gleam in its eyes.

"**It would amuse me, what other reason do I need? Let's face it you need all the help you can get. You're weak, it pathetic really.**"

"I'm seven."

"**...whatever.**"

"So you'll just give me a new bloodline with no strings attached?"

The fox looked thoughtful for a moment before its eyes took on a slight glimmer.

"**Well...I guess you'll just owe me one, won't you.**"

The fox paused here, seeing how Naruto would react. All it got was a blank look for several minutes before...

"That's it?"

"**That's it**"

Naruto thought about it for a moment then agreed, what harm could it do?

"Okay."

With that the Kyuubi sent as much of its chakra through the bars of its cage as it could, slowly making its way towards Naruto, who stood there, staring into the fox's eyes, seeming to ignore the bubbling red chakra as it slowly started to climb up his small legs, and after a moment was covering his entire body.

After a few minutes it started to soak into his body until nothing was left.

"**It's done."**

"So what can I do?"

"**You can be anything."**

Naruto looked at the fox for a moment.

"Isn't that just crap parents tell their kids to make them feel better?"

The fox looked at the boy, trying to tell if he was serious, a large sweat drop appearing at the back of its head.

"**Well...yes...it is, but in his case it's literal. I gave you the ability to shape shift, its only limitations are your imagination and size. The bigger the thing you change into the more chakra it will take.**"

Naruto thought about that for a moment, it did sound useful to be able to change into practically anything...

"How does it work?"

"**It's simple enough; just picture the form you want to change into in your mind, and channel chakra through your body.**"

"I can be anything?"

"**Pretty much...oh, I should probably warn you that if you're not careful you could lose control, and go on a killing spree, slaughtering everything in sight. Sounds fun right? I personally hope that happens at least a few times.**"

Naruto just stared at the fox for a moment. It made sense, and he didn't really care either way anymore.

"...fair enough."

The fox just stared at the boy in front of it for a long moment, before bursting out in laughter.

"**Hahahahaha...they...ha...they really did break you didn't they...ha. Kami this is the most fun I've had in century's...hahaha.**"

Naruto just stood there, staring at the fox as it continued to laugh. When the Kyuubi calmed down enough to stop laughing it turned back to the boy.

"**Thanks for that...woo, I needed that. Anyway I think it's time for you to wake up, see you later kit.**"

Before Naruto could reply he felt dizzy, and fell back into the water. When he opened his eyes he could see the old man leaning over him.

XXX

**End Flashback**

XXX

He could feel it, the way his body shifted to his will, his muscles ripping and knitting back together under his skin. The way his bones were braking, stretching and reforming into something different. The way his clothes just melded into his body, as if they were never there. It was excruciating, almost as painful as the feeling of being burnt alive for hours on end, but more than that it was euphoric. He had never felt so alive.

When it was done he stood up and stepped back from the pink haired woman; she was so scared of what was in front of her that she couldn't scream. Standing in front of her, in all its eight foot glory was... she didn't even know what to call it, something out of a nightmare maybe?

If only she knew.

It actually _was _from a nightmare, one of Naruto's to be precise. His very skin was covered an ivory white shell, the only clothing he had was a torn black cloth that covered his waist down to his knees, held up by bandages tied to his waist, his body covered in muscles, reminiscent of a body builder. Long spiky blonde hair went down to his feet, and strange red markings covered his entire body, huge hands with long, boney fingers tipped in vicious scythe-like claws. He had what seemed to be white spikes with red tips growing out of his shoulders, pointing in random directions, and a long tail coming out the base of his spine, the end of which was a deep crimson, as if it had been dipped in fresh blood.

But what really scared her was his face and chest.

A demonized skull like mask covered his face with long, sharp teeth spread in a horrifying grin with more of the red markings on the left side of its face. Cold yellow eyes ringed in black with a sickening glee shining in their eyes as they stared down at her, and a hole in the centre of his chest where his heart should be.

Naruto just stood there a moment to admire himself in the reflection of the broken glass that was in his window. This had been one of the creatures he had seen in his nightmares, right down to the last detail. He laughed, he couldn't stop himself. He absently noted that his voice had a strange echo to it, as if more than one voice was talking at the same time. The irony, for years this creature had haunted his nights; now it would haunt others as well.

Without saying a word he bent down and grabbed the pink haired lady by her throat, lifting her up easily with one hand above his head, and with no effort at all, threw her through the window into the street outside, jumping out after her. He slowly made his way over to her broken body.

She was covered in cuts and glass shards from the window, both her arms were bent at odd angles, obviously broken in several places; she was still conscious, if only just. He couldn't have that; he wanted her fully aware for what he was going to do. Quicker than most eyes could see he speared her through the abdomen with the end of his tail, and held it there for a moment, listening to her gargled screams as blood rose to her throat.

It was music to his ears.

He then sent a small pulse of his chakra through his tail and into the woman on the ground at his feet. Instantly her eyes shot open; she started to scream as loud as her abused lungs would allow her, causing Naruto to stop yet again to listen to her screams. When he had enough of that he picked up his foot, and brought it down on her, mostly uninjured left leg, shattering the bone.

He tilted his head to the side in fascination as her screaming changed pitch, so he did it again with her right leg, then each of her already broken arms. Each time he did this she made a new sound.

XXX

A platoon of five ANBU that had heard the screams and came to investigate, were watching in stunned silence as they saw some -_thing_, mutilating the woman; but what shocked them more was that it was the woman they had spent the last week looking for. She had somehow managed to get away on the night of the Incident, and had avoided them ever since.

A cat masked ANBU turned to another with a dragon mask, asking in a clearly feminine voice.

"What should we do, captain?"

The now identified captain remained quiet for a moment, staring at what was happening in stunned silence, before replying.

"You go and inform the Hokage, we will stay here, and try to subdue it, hurry." With that she was gone in a swirl of leafs.

The four remaining ANBU jumped off the building they were stood on, running towards the creature.

Spotting them out of the corner of his eye, Naruto grabbed his limp prey by the throat and held her to his chest to use as a human shield as he turned to face the ANBU, still cackling insanely. They stopped in their tracks, not expecting the...creature to have seen them coming. Stepping forward the dragon masked ANBU spoke.

"Drop the woman and get on the ground, do you understand me?"

The creature just laughed at him.

Then, slowly reaching around the woman's stomach dragged his free hand; Naruto used the claw on his index finger to slowly cut a line across her stomach. For a moment nothing happened before a red line appeared, followed by a burst of blood, and the pink haired woman's intestines fell onto the floor with a wet slap.

The ANBU were shocked at the act of brutality, but what was even worse was that the woman was still alive; but not for long, just before the light left her eyes, the creature reached a hand around her neck, and with one quick jerk, pulled her head from her shoulders. What little blood was left in her body spurted out of the hole where her head once sat, covering Naruto's face.

What he did next shocked the ANBU as, in his echo-like voice, he started to... sing?

**"Ring, a round the roses,**  
**A pocket full of posies,**  
**A-tish-yoo, a-tish-yoo,**  
_**You**_**, all fall **_**down**_**!"**

At the end of the song he started to laugh again, the sound of his voice, echoing across the village as he threw his head back, and laughed.

One of the ANBU, a large man in a bear mask, ran forward.

"No! Stop! We have to take it together!" called out the captain, but it was too late.

The bear masked ANBU started to run through hand signs as he ran straight towards the beast, but before he could finish, the creature appeared in front of him, grabbing his arms just below the shoulders. The ANBU let out a scream as the hands got tighter and tighter; the arms falling to his sides limply, getting number by the second until, with a quick jerk, both his arms were pulled off just below the shoulder; but before he could get over his shock at the loss of his arms, Naruto used the one in his right hand as club hitting him in the face so hard his head exploded in a shower of blood, and gore; his laughter never letting up for even a second.

Without further ado, the remaining three ANBU sprang into action.

"**Wood style: Tree Bind**"

Instantly long pieces of wood shot out of the ground and wrapped themselves around the beast's arms, legs, neck and chest.

"**Fire style: Great Fire Ball**"

"**Wind style: Great Breakthrough**"

The two jutsu joined together, the fire being fuelled by the wind, turning white from the increased heat, and the laughter stopped as soon as the attack hit; the ANBU releasing a sigh of relief, only to take a step back in fear when it started again, if weaker than before.

Nothing had ever survived that combination, nothing.

When the smoke cleared they could clearly see the creature still standing, if only just. Its body was covered in what seemed to be cracks; as they watched the shell-like skin started to move, like millions of worms were curling under it as its body started to shrink.

The Hokage arrived with the cat masked ANBU, just in time to see the beast before it disappeared, leaving an unconscious Naruto with a large crazy grin on his face, his small body almost completely covered in blood. Looking at the bloodbath before him, then to the seven year old boy, Sarutobi could only say one thing.

"Dear Kami, Naruto... what have you done?"

XXX

**Like I said at the top of the chapter for the most part it will be the same, though I am planning on making a few changes here and there. If any of you have any ideas you think would be useful don't be afraid to tell me, I might not use them but as far as I'm concerned no idea is a bad idea :)**

**One more thing, I am debating with myself if I should remove the original True Horror or not when I have finished the rewrite, what do you think?**

**R&R**


	2. From the School to the Academy

XXX

**Disclaimer****- I own nothing **:(

XXX

Chapter 2: From the School to the Academy

**One year later**

Sarutobi slowly made his way down the dark corridor, a man in a long white coat trailing right behind him. They wasn't in a rush, his reason for coming wasn't going to be going anywhere and to be honest he didn't want to be here at all. Theses visits always brought up bad memories.

Not looking back at the man the elderly Hokage asked.

"Has there been any change?"

The man didn't even slow his paces as he looked down at the clipboard in his hand.

"I'm sorry, Hokage-sama, there has been no change since the last time you were here."

Sarutobi just gave a nod and kept walking.

The School was a depressing place, built not long after the village itself, 'The School' was an underground base created for the express purpose of housing and, if possible, rehabilitation of shinobi that couldn't cope with the stress or responsibilities of the job. Those that had let their guilt overwhelm them, or that had had given into their bloodlust, if a ninja had a mental breakdown of any kind, they were sent here.

On both sides of the corridor were solid steel doors with heavy locks, a small window so the workers and doctors could see into them to check on the occupants and at the bottom of each door was a small hinged door that were used to deliver food.

They continued down the corridor for several minutes, the only sounds heard being the mutterings of patients in the rooms they passed, until they came to the door at the end of the hall. Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Sarutobi looked through the small window in the door.

It was more or less the same as all the other cells, white walls with a simple cot in the corner of the small room. But what made this one stand out so much from the others was that the walls, floor and roof were covered in blue glowing seals. They were the only source of light in the cell and made it look like something out of a horror movie. Another thing that made it stand out from the other cells was the fact that there was dried blood on the walls and floor along with the seals and finally, the last thing that set this cell apart from the others, was that it was the only one that didn't have a shinobi.

This was the room of one Uzumaki Naruto. After what had happened with the Miss Haruno, Sarutobi had done all he could to help Naruto. But when he started killing villagers he'd had no other choice but to put him here.

The seals were applied by his old student Jiraiya, who had been beside himself with rage when he heard about what had happened and were designed to do two things. The first was to strengthen the room itself and the second was to constantly drain as much of Naruto's chakra as possible constantly without killing him.

The only problem was that it turned out that, because of the amount of chakra the Kyuubi had to force into Naruto's body in order to heal it, the boy body had been literally saturated in demonic chakra. This had resulted in Naruto gaining chakra reserves far beyond what was ever thought possible and if anyone other than Naruto was to go in that room with the seals active they would be killed in a matter of seconds. As it was, they only seemed to make him slightly tired.

When the boy had first been admitted about six months ago they had sent a Yamanaka to try and assess his mental state. Needless to say it didn't end well and he was now in the cell next to Naruto's. A few weeks later a doctor had gone in to try a talk to the boy face to face, which was the source of the dried blood on the walls and floor.

Looking into the room, Sarutobi started to panic when he didn't see anyone inside and was about to turn around to asked the doctor where Naruto was when he jumped back from the door, heart beating a mile a minute when a face appeared just on the other side of the glass.

But it wasn't Naruto's.

The face in the glass was that of a young girl with long messy black hair hat fell down her head and covered parts of her face from view. She was so pale she had an almost blue shine to her skin, with thin black veins clearly visible, which was only accentuated by the glow of the seals and had dark rings around her mouth and glowing orange eyes.

She had a small, cruel smirk on her face as she looked at Sarutobi and just looking at her sent shivers down the old Hokage's spine.

"Stop playing games Naruto, I'm not in the mood for it today."

The girl's smirk turned into a full-blown grin at the old mans words, showing her slime covered black teeth and tongue, which she pocked out from between her teeth and licked her lips with.

"Awww, you don't want to play with me old man? That's not fair, the doctors are _so_ boring; they've seen most of what I can do. But you, I've got so much I can show you old man, so any things..."

Her voice sounded so innocent, like the tinkling of bells, it didn't seem right that a voice like that could come out of something so... _wrong_.

The old Hokage didn't say anything, just stared into her bright orange eyes with an unflinching gaze until eventually, after the two had stared at each other for a few minuets, the girl broke eye contact and pouted. As the two men watched they could see the face change into that of a blonde haired, blue eyed boy, with his entire body covered in white surgical bandages.

"...You're no fun old man."

Turning his back to the door Naruto stepped away before jumping onto his cot in the corner, easily clearing the distance, and gave the two men stood outside his door a chance to get a good look at him.

He had grown; when he was first brought here he was barely three foot five, but now he was a solid four foot. He was very thin, no matter what or how much the doctors gave him he just wouldn't put on any weight, leaving him with a rather skeletal look to his young form. His spiky blonde hair had grown longer in the last year, now reaching down to his upper back. He was wearing a modified black strait jacket with a hood attached at the back of the neck, the sleeves hanging down past his arms, almost touching the floor and plane black pants going down to just above his bandaged feet.

No skin could be seen.

He just lay there, staring at the roof with his hands folded behind his head. Every now and then he would brake out into chuckles, as if someone was telling him jokes that only he could hear.

If only they knew.

"How have you been Naruto?"

He didn't answer straight away, but when the Hokage was about to ask again he spoke.

"I am how I am and I'm not how I'm not."

Queue more laughing.

Sarutobi sighed again, he was used to this, getting round about answers that didn't really tell him anything and he was about to turn away when he heard Naruto call him back.

"Hey old man."

As he looked back at the boy he could see him trying to hold back more laughter.

"... Yes Naruto."

"What has no legs, no arms and goes AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! For the love of Kami why!"

"Naruto..."

"Guess."

"Stop it Naruto"

"**GUESS! GUESS! GUESS! GUESS! **"

Sarutobi was slightly taken aback by that.

"I... Don't know Naruto, what is it."

At this point Naruto finally took his eyes off the roof and locked eyes with Sarutobi, giggling to himself.

"A villager...after I've pulled their limbs off."

They kept eye contact for several more seconds before Naruto couldn't hold it anymore and started laughing again and without another word Sarutobi turned around and left, the sound of Naruto's insane laughter following him down the corridor as he went, taunting him.

XXX

**Four years later**

Five years, it had been five years since 'the incident', five years since Naruto had killed all those people and five years since he had no other choice but to put Naruto in 'The School'. Though at least the new civilian council this time around didn't petition him everyday to execute 'The Kyuubi brat', they still didn't like the boy. But after what had happened to the last council, they were at least neutral.

He couldn't believe he let Danzo talk him into this, it was a big risk, but if it worked...making his way down the corridor towards Naruto's cell, he couldn't help but hope the boy would agree.

Looking into the room it still surprised him just how much it took to keep the boy contained now compared to several years ago. When he was younger it had been easy enough, just the seals around the room could keep him contained, but then they found out that there was a side effect to the seals. Because they were on all the time, putting a constant strain on Naruto's chakra coils his already unbelievable reserves grew even larger.

So every year they needed to increase the security until the final result was what lay before him. The walls were the same, covered in seals and dried blood, but now there was no cot in the corner. Naruto was knelt in the centre of the cell with thick, his arms restrained behind his back with the black straight jacket and black chains holding him into place bolted to the floor, walls and ceiling. The chains were covered in the same seals, glowing with the same soft blue light that radiated from the others around the room.

The boy looked up when he noticed Sarutobi standing there, but didn't say anything, just stared at him with that insane grin he had become so well known for.

"How have you been Naruto?"

"I am how I am and I'm not how I'm not."

This had become a routine for the two; it was almost enough to bring a smile to the old mans face. It was one of the few things Naruto did that didn't have any malicious intent behind it.

"I have a proposition for you."

"...I' flattered...really I am...scratch that I'm not at all. Has it really been that long since you got any old man that you're coming to mental patients? Because if you are I think the kunoichi ward is on a different floor."

"...it's not that kind of proposition Naruto."

After making sure he had Naruto's full attention Sarutobi continued.

"You can't spend the rest of your life here and the council agrees, so we have decided to offer you a chance to become a ninja of Konoha."

There was a moment of silence before Naruto's grin spread even wider.

"I'm listening."

"You would need to behave, no killing, mauling, mentally scaring or mutilating civilians, clients, classmates, teammates, teachers or other shinobi/kunoichi of the leaf."

"... I _think..._I could do that."

This brought a smile to the old mans face, he had agreed.

"Good, I will be back soon to release you and take you, I will be teaching you a few of the basics of being a shinobi and in a few days you will go to the academy to meet the other genin, as you don't know the academy Jutsu you will be allowed to skip the exam. But as it's you... well...I don't think you will have any problems."

As he turned to go and fill in the necessary paperwork he was stopped when Naruto asked him a question that made him hesitate.

"Hey old man...can I still kill other ninja?"

At the end of the question he was starting to chuckle to himself.

Sarutobi thought about that for a moment before answering.

"...Yes Naruto...you can kill other ninja."

And with that he left, listening to Naruto's laughter and thinking about what he was about to unleash on the shinobi world.

XXX

As Umino Iruka stood in front of his class room he could already feel the headache coming on. It was the last day and they still wouldn't be quiet, so after taking a big breath he did the hand sign for his infamous '**Bighead Jutsu**'.

"SHUT THE HELL UP YOU BRATS!"

Instantly everything went quiet.

"That's better, now as you know today is the day you are sorted into your three man teams, the problem with this is that we are one person short. However, Hokage-sama has found a suitable candidate and will be bringing them here in a few minuets. So I want you all on your best behaviour."

At hearing that there would be someone new the class burst into hushed whispers. Whoever this mysterious last edition was, if they were hand picked by the Hokage himself then they must be strong. It even got the attention of one Uchiha Sasuke, though his thoughts weren't the same as the majority of his class.

'_Finally someone that might give me a challenge._'

It was at this point that Inuzuka Kiba decided to share his thoughts.

"Wait a minuet, what about the exam. We all took it; it's not fair if this new guy doesn't!"

"Calm down Kiba, there are special circumstances that not even I know about. When they arrive you can ask them yourself, provided you are polite about it."

That seemed to satisfy the boy for the time being and after Kiba's outburst they all returned to their individual conversation stalking about what they thought the new student would be like. It was a few minuets later that a knock was herd at the door, the class falling silent again as Iruka went to open it.

"Welcome Hokage-sama, thank you for taking the time out of your day to come."

"It's no problem Iruka."

After the old Hokage walked into the room the class could see the boy followed him in.

He was average height, with a strange black jacket with buckles all over it, a hood sewed into the back of the neck and sleeves that went down past his hands and to his knees. Long spiky blonde hair that went to just above his waste, bandages covering his entire body hiding any exposed flesh from view. The only parts of his face that could be seen were his blue eyes and his mouth that had a huge grin on his face. After that the only thing worth taking note of was the fact that he was thin, worryingly so, the white bandages that he had wrapped around him gave his body and almost skeletal effect he was so skinny.

It actually unnerved them a little.

It was at this point that they turned their attention back to Iruka; for the first time since the two had entered the room. He was backed against the wall on the opposite side of the room from the door, staring at the boy in front of him with wide, fear filled eyes. His skin had gone deadly pale and they could all see the beads of sweat trailing down his face.

Seeing his reaction, Sarutobi turned to face the clearly terrified man.

"Don't worry Iruka, Naruto has promised me he will behave himself,"

This did seem to calm the man a little; if there was one thing known about the boy stood before him it was that he has never broken his word. It was a mystery; no matter how insane he was he still had some kind of moral code. Unfortunately nobody knew what most of it was accept the boy, and maybe the Hokage.

But he was still unsure this was a good idea.

"Are you sure Hokage-sama?"

"Very, you have nothing to worry about, isn't that right Naruto...Naruto?"

When the boy didn't answer the old man he turned to face him, only to find he wasn't there anymore. Quickly looking around he spotted the boy crouched on a desk staring down at Sasuke, their faces only inches apart and the already monstrous gin on his face stretching to what most would believe to be a painful degree.

The class and Iruka were stunned; they hadn't even seen him move.

When Sasuke had gotten over his own shock, though he was carful not to let anyone know he had been, the last Uchiha asked in a clearly irritated voice.

"What are you looking at?"

Naruto just kept staring.

When Sasuke had enough of waiting he was about to ask again and that was when Naruto spoke.

"Did you know you have a duck ass on your head?"

At this the class burst out laughing, all except for the Sasuke, and a few of his fan girls, but when he made a grab at him Naruto was already back next to the Hokage.

"Naruto... you said you would behave."

Naruto turned his him and grin still in place, though several of he more perceptive students noticed the slight edge it now held.

"Nooo...I said I wouldn't kill, mame or permanently break them, you never said anything about _behaving_."

None of them knew if he was joking or not, but after a moment of uncomfortable silence, most of them just brushed it off... most.

Sarutobi took a deep breath, before letting it out slowly as he shook his head.

'_At least he didn't kill anyone...yet_.'

"Just introduce yourself so we can move on please."

"Yh, yh, whatever you say old man"

Many in the room gasped at the disrespect he was showing to the leader of the village.

"My name is Uzumaki Naruto, I like what I like and I hate what I hate, though... nothing I hate seems to be around for long when I hate it."

After saying this he broke out into giggles.

"I don't have a dream or goal in my life, because quite frankly, I don't actually have any will to live, hahaha!"

After seeing their faces when he said this he couldn't hold it in any longer, he laughed and with the introduction over Naruto just sat on the floor where he was stood and started muttering quietly to himself, giggling at random times and seeming to ignore them.

Deciding to humour him the Hokage nodded to Iruka to continue with the team placements.

"R-Right...hm, well I guess we can move one, Team 1 will be comprised of..."

It went on like that for several minuets.

"Team 7 will be Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura and Inuzuka Kiba under Hatake Kakashi."

When Iruka had said her name Sakura jumped up screaming about true love.

It was then that Naruto saw her for the first time, and for a moment his grin slipped off his face and his body went stiff, but the moment pasted before anyone could see it, except Sarutobi.

When Sakura had calmed down Iruka continued.

"Team 8 will be Hyuga Hinata, Aburame Shino and...Uzumaki Naruto. Your jonin will be YuhiKurenai."

After pausing for a moment to see if there were anymore reactions, the scared chunin finished his list

"And finally team 10 will be Akimichi Choji, Nara Shikamaru and Yamanaka Ino under Sarutobi Asuma.

When he finished reading out the names Iruka put down the list and turned back to the class.

"I want you to know that I am proud of all of you and that I expect great things from every single one of you. Remember, you are all shinobi of the leaf now and that it is a big responsibility. I trust you to act accordingly. Your new instructors will be here soon to pick you up."

And with that both the Hokage, and a rather reluctant Iruka, left the room, closing the door behind them and leaving the class alone... with Naruto.

They all looked at him for a moment, not sure what they should do.

He just looked back with that huge grin on his face.

"_...__I think I'm going to enjoy this._"

XXX

Yuhi Kurenai was a beautiful woman, no one could or would argue with that, though there where several women that had tried. She was an average height at 5'6, with long brown hair that cascaded down her back and a wonderful figure that was the envy of almost every woman in Konoha. Her clothes were made of what appeared to be bandages mad to resemble a short skirt, with one red sleeve, white shorts and a mesh under shirt. She wore almost no makeup, just some red lipstick and blue eye shadow and with her exotic red eyes she was without a doubt one of the most beautiful kunoichi in the village.

But right now none of that mattered, because as she made her way through the academy to meet her soon to be students, proving they passed her test, Kurenai couldn't help but feel nervous. She remembered when some of her friends had taken teams; they had been excited at the thought of teaching. But then again none of them had a recently released mental patient for a potential student.

The Hokage had assured her that he was safe to be around, at lest to an extent, and that she and the other would be fine. Though, he did mention that prolonged exposure to the boy could be detrimental to a person's mental stability...

XXX

Flash back- five hours earlier

XXX

"Hokage-sama you can't be serious. That boy is dangerous."

Kurenai had an incredulous look on her face, thinking that maybe the old mans age was finally catching up to him after all these years. They were currently sat in the Hokage office and the he had just told her that Naruto, possibly Konohas most insane resident since its creation, would be on her genin team.

She knew of the boy, hell everyone knew of him, but unlike many people she didn't blame him for being the Kyuubi container, if anything she felt sorry for him. She didn't even blame him for losing his mind, but the fact is he was put in the school for a reason.

Looking at the brunet from his seat on the other side of his desk, his hands folded under his chin, Sarutobi let out a small sigh. He should have known this would happen.

"Kurenai calm down, I may be old but I'm not senile yet, I know what I'm doing. Do you really think I would put you and your other students at risk? Despite what many think he is not as dangerous as the villagers would like you to believe."

Kurenai couldn't help the open shock that crossed her face at the old Hokage's words, or the slight edge that entered her voice as she replied.

"With all due respect Hokage-sama, he was put in the school for a reason...several actually. He killed innocent people, destroyed property and, if I remember correctly, he castrated three men and though their testicles through an old ladies window. How could you say he is not as dangerous as they say?"

Sarutobi looked at her for a long minuet before he let out a deep sigh.

"Kurenai...I'm disappointed in you."

Those words shocked her, but before she could say anything he continued.

"As a ninja you should always look underneath the underneath before making assumptions and, as an intelligence gatherer, you should know better then to listen to hearsay from a group of bitter villagers. Did it ever occur to you that if those villagers really were innocent, Naruto would have been put to death?"

Kurenai's eyes widened at the implications, she had never really thought about it like that, but the fact was that Naruto should have been executed for the things he had done. Which left the question, why wasn't he?

"But if that's true...I don't understand, I thought you put him in the school because he was dangerous?"

"I did, but at the time there were too many...holes, too many things that didn't add up. So I looked into it further and discovered some concerning facts that had been left out of the original reports. It turns out that Naruto; in the few weeks leading up to him being put in The School, never technically did anything wrong."

Kurenai was about to object to this, but again the Hokage continued before she could.

"In the case of Miss Haruno, self defence. There was never any doubt about that, but the others..."

Here Sarutobi took out his pipe and lit it, taking a deep breath before reaching into one of the draws on his desk and pulling out a white folder. He laid it out on the desk in front of him before skimming it with his eyes.

"The first ten men he killed, self defence, turns out they were drunk and attacked him. The three men in the ally that he castrated, the morning after the incident I was approached by a man that reported the same three men had attempted to rape his eight year old daughter n her way home from the academy, Naruto stopped them. As for the 'old lady' that to mentioned she was the previous master of the orphanage that he grew up in and we found out they were selling children into slavery outside the village. Every one of the people Naruto killed, tortured or...broke, were later found to have either attacked him first or found guilty of crimes."

Kurenai didn't know what to say that, how could she have been pulled in by the villagers so easily? She prided herself on her ninja skills and it was a known fact that she was one of the best kunoichi in the village. But this was a huge mistake on her part.

It was wile she was thinking over all of the information the Hokage had given her that something occurred to the red eyed jonin that didn't make sense to her.

"But Hokage-sama if this is true then why was he kept in The School, surely he should have been released when this was found out? Why did you leave him there?"

At this question the Hokage got a sad look in his eyes.

"Because he asked me to..."

Again, Kurenai was shocked; nobody asked to be kept in the school.

"But...why?"

Sarutobi took another deep breath from his pipe before letting it out again.

"At that point Naruto still had some semblance of his old self. He still does, though it's burred under the insanity. In a moment of lucidity he realized what was happening to him, he could see what was happening and knew that if he didn't get away from people for a while he could lose himself completely. So he asked to be left in the school until I thought he could be trusted. I have watched him over the years, and I can honestly say that although he is the most insane fucker I know, he is also one of my most trusted people."

At seeing the confused look on the young woman's face he elaborated.

"Its true that Naruto is insane but he was able keep what makes him a good person, at least some of it. He has morals, they can be hard to see and even harder to understand, but they are there. He never hurts children; scare them, yes, but never hurt them. He also has a respect for women, at least to a certain extent, which all things considered is a miracle and he will never break a promise once it has been made if it's within his power."

Kurenai didn't know what to say.

"However..."

Bring her full attention back to the Hokage; Kurenai saw a sad look cross his face.

"...there is a problem. He can't control himself when he kills and will make anyone that he deems worth the effort killing go through extreme pain before he will let them die. He has been known to scare ANBU with his... methods, both psychological and physical, and the IT department has expressed an interest in having Naruto come in and...talk, to several of their more tight lipped guests."

That worried Kurenai, ANBU were trained to be fearless, to not let anything bother them. They were best of the best. The fact that the Intelligence and torture department would be interested in asking for his help in breaking people was even scarier.

Taking a deep breath, Kurenai asked.

"Can you tell me anything about his abilities? If he is going to be on my team I need to know what to expect."

This made Sarutobi smile.

"He has enhanced senses, strength, reflexes and he is able to process information at an astonishing rate. He has been out of the school for only two days and has already made his way through most of the Konoha library."

That surprised Kurenai, the Konoha library was huge, filled with books and scrolls on pretty much anything you could image. To her knowledge one of the only things that you couldn't find there were Jutsu. For him to be able to not only read, but understand so much information in such a short amount of time was truly amazing.

"He also has a bloodline which has been designated as '**Shape Shifter**', the ability to change his body into almost anything. If Naruto can picture it in his mind he can more then likely become it. It is similar to the **Transformation Jutsu **except it's not an illusion."

Kurenai's eyes widened as implications of this were spinning through her head. To be able to become anything, the potential was practically limitless.

"However there is a catch, the longer he uses it the harder it is to keep it up or in some cases, to come back. From what he has told me he is currently able to hold a basic '_Shift'_, as he called it, making himself look like another person, for three days but the more complex it is the harder it gets. From what he has told me when Shifts into more complex creatures it comes with an enormous increase in bloodlust and if he holds it for too long his mind separates itself from his body for a time and he will kill everything in sight. If that happens there is nothing he, nor anyone else can do until h runs out of chakra and his body, as he so elegantly put it 'resets' itself."

It made sense; with every bloodline there was always a weakness, something that limited it. But the thought of what could happen to both her and anyone else caught in the way of Naruto if he lost control sent a shiver down her spine. She also now understood why he was on her team in the first place. With a bloodline to change into anything he could make a great intelligent gatherer and with his... other... talents, he would be the perfect cover for the rest of them if the need to retreat should arise. But before she could go into anymore thought on this however, Kurenai was broken out of her thoughts when the Hokage stood up from his chair.

"I'm sorry Kurenai but I need to go and check on him now before he runs out of books to read and moves on to something else. I hope I can trust you to teach your future students to the best of your ability."

Standing up from her chair, Kurenai did a small bow to her leader, a determined expression set on her face.

"Yes Hokage-sama, I understand."

XXX

Flashback end

XXX

As she can to the door, Kurenai stop with her hand on the door as the sound of voices reached her ears.

XXX

They all sat in silence for a few minuets, just staring at the strange boy in front of them. He was just sitting there, looking around the room with that creepy grin on his face and muttering to himself quietly so they couldn't hear what he was saying.

Eventually Kiba, being the hyperactive loudmouth he is, took it upon himself to break the silence. Standing up from his seat he made his way to the front of the room where Naruto was sat, smirking to himself at the thought of proving his dominance to the rest of his class over the new guy. He was confident that he would put the blonde in place that he didn't even notice Akamaru shrinking back into his hood and shaking the closer they got to the bandaged boy.

"So...you're the guy that's too good to go to the academy like the rest of us, you don't look so strong. I bet you don't even know any Jutsu."

Naruto just sat there for a moment, looking up at Kiba until, slowly standing up, he looked Kiba in the eyes and asked.

"What's a Jutsu?"

The others in the room looked at Naruto incredulously for a long moment, what kind of ninja didn't know what a Jutsu was. But the shocked silence was broken when Kiba started laughing and pointing at Naruto, the rest of the class joining him not long after.

"You... you... you don't even know what a Jutsu is, ha! Did you grow up in a cave or something?"

"No, but I have spent the last five years of my life chained up in a mental institution filled with mentally unstable ninja."

The laughter turned into shocked silence once again. Was he serious?

Looking at the blonde in front of him with bit of weariness in his eyes, Kiba took several steppes away without even realising it, still not noticing the way Akamaru was cowering in his hood.

"You're joking...right?"

"Nope, hey did you know you need a bath? You smell like dog piss."

That got to Kiba; nobody embarrasses him in front of his class. His nervousness suddenly forgotten as red clouded his vision; the young Inuzuka almost started frothing at the mouth as he stared at Naruto with wild eyes, not realizing that Akamaru had actually pissed in his hood.

"What did you say? I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!"

In his rage Kiba charged at Naruto without thinking, his fist pulled back in preparation to punch the blonde right in the face. But before he could even lay a finger on him, Naruto had his right hand on the back of Kiba's head and was slamming it into the ground, or so it seemed. Just before Kiba's face connected with the concrete floor it stopped.

Bending down so he was next to Kiba's ear, Naruto spoke in a voice that sent shivers down everyone's spines.

"I have killed people for attacking me and the only reason I haven't killed you is because I promised the old man I wouldn't. Think yourself lucky, pup."

And with that he let Kiba fall to the ground, his grin still on his face.

Kiba shuffled away as quick as possible, not looking at Naruto, and made his way back to his seat. The room was quite again, no one knowing what to say after that.

What no one expected though was for Sakura to slowly make her way over to Naruto, ignoring Ino as she tried to tell her old friend to come back.

When she was in front of him the pink haired girl took a deep, shaky breath, before looking into his eyes with more steel in them then anyone had ever seen in all their years in the academy.

"...you said your name was Naruto?"

At his nod she continued.

"My dad said that if I ever met you to say that we are sorry for what my mother did and to ask for forgiveness, but he never said why...?"

She let the question hang, hoping he would explain.

Naruto just gave her an odd look for a minuet, before his grin faded into a small, genuine smile.

"Thank you, and tell you're farther that there is nothing to forgive, her actions were her own and I hold no grudge against you or your family."

At hearing this Sakura let out a breath she didn't know she was holding, though she was a little disappointed that he didn't tell her what her mother had done.

"As for what she did...well, I can honestly say that your mother made me what I am today."

When he said this, his grin returned in full force. It sent a shiver up her spine, as well as all those in the room, but before anyone could comment further the door opened and a group of people walked into the room and one by one they introduced themselves as the sensei's and took there respective team out of the room.

"Team 8, I'm your jonin sensei Yuhi Kurenai, please follow me."

With that Shino, Hinata and a still grinning Naruto followed her out of the room.

XXX

They said nothing on there way to the training ground, all lost in their own thoughts, Shino and Hinata didn't know what to think of the strange blonde. He seemed strong, at least from what they had seen from his 'fight' with Kiba, but he completely out of his mind. Kurenai was trying not to smile, she had heard everything that had gone on in the room and was happy to know that he didn't hold a grudge against the Haruno family, or kill the Inuzuka boy for that matter.

And Naruto was thinking.

"_I wonder what that tree tastes like..."_

When they had come to training ground 8 Kurenai motioned for them to sit down. It was a pretty basic training field, a small forest surrounding it to hide them from view, a lake and lastly training posts. When they were all seated she spoke.

"Right, my name is Yuhi Kurenai; I am twenty-four years old and am going to be your new sensei. I specialize in genjutsu and intelligence gathering, my dream is to prove that women can be just as good ninja as men. Now who wants to introduce themselves next?"

Shino raised his hand and began to speak in a monotone.

"My name is Aburame Shino; I'm twelve years old and specialize in my clan's Jutsu. I like collecting different samples of insect life to help improve my colony and hope to prove that my clan is not weak just because we use bugs."

Nodding, Kurenai turned to Hinata.

"I-I-I-I'm H-H-Hyuga Hinata, I-I-I-I am t-twelve years old a-and I sp-specialize in my cl-clan's Jutsu. I h-hope to o-one day u-u-u-unite my clan."

Hearing the stutter Kurenai made a mental note to introduce the girl to Anko, if anyone could break her of it, it would be her. Turning to her last student, she was surprised to see him... tuning a violin? Where the hell had he got a violin? It was jet black, with blood red strings and red lining the edge.

After a minuet he seemed satisfied and spoke, not even bothering to look up at them.

"My name is Uzumaki Naruto, I'm twelve years old and I specialize in infiltration, torture and assassination. I'm also looking into several other things as well. I have nothing I wish to accomplish."

At hearing that he was learning other things Kurenai got interested.

"What other things are you learning?"

Looking back up at her from his violin he said.

"Well... weapon crafting, seal making, chakra theory and a few different fighting styles that I plan to merge together into my own personal style, though I might try to crate more then one just for the fu of it. I was going to look into jutsu theory, but due to certain...problems that complicate my ability to use the majority of them I decided against it."

Kurenai and the two genin didn't know what to think; most ninja picked a specialty and stuck with it. Whether it was taijutsu, genjutsu, ninjutsu or kinjutsu, a ninja would normally pick something and stick with it, but here was Naruto looking at several different aspects like it was nothing.

Without any of them realising Naruto had started to play his violin which, considering his hands were still covered by his sleeves was impressive. Kurenai didn't know what he was playing; it started off slow but was slowly getting quicker. It was then that she felt it, the feeling of someone casting a genjutsu. Naruto was channelling huge amount of chakra into the music to act as a wide scale sound based genjutsu.

Smiling to herself as she discreetly cancelled its effects on her, but not the others, Kurenai sat and watched as she waited to see what would happen, enjoying the music as she waited. Naruto was doing her job for her, the test she had been planning was to see if they could detect and dispel a genjutsu anyway, so why not let him do it.

She watched as Hinata and Shino fall into some kind of trance and started to sway with the music, their eyes losing focus as they listened to Naruto playing the violin. Shino was the first to notice something was wrong, his bugs telling him that he was in a genjutsu, and calmly putting his hand on Hinata's shoulder he broke them both out.

When she was sure they were both out of the Jutsu Kurenai smiled.

"Good work Shino, and well done for helping your teammate out. But I have to ask Naruto, why did you try to put us in a genjutsu in the first place?"

When she asked this Naruto stopped playing and looked at her as if she was crazy.

"What the hell you talking bout, I can't cast a genjutsu to save my life. I've got too much chakra."

This surprised Kurenai, he was right he did have too much chakra to do genjutsu, but she had assumed that was why he was using a violin as a medium. Could it be possible he did it without realising it? She would have to talk to the Hokage about this.

"Naruto are you saying you didn't know you were channelling chakra through your violin while you were playing it?"

"Of course I was, it's something I read in a book about chakra control. This is actually my ninth violin in the two days; they kept exploding, so I had to put a reinforcement seal on this one to help reinforce it."

The casual way that he said this made her laugh, as if exploding violins were normal. Although, this was Naruto, who knew what went on in his head?

Hinata and Shino were confused so, building up her courage, Hinata raised her hand to get the older kunoichi's attention.

"W-w-w-what do you m-m-m-mean Kurenai s-sensei?"

Turning to face the two Kurenai smiled before explaining.

"It's quite simple really, Naruto was channelling chakra through his violin and it acted as a medium for a genjutsu. He didn't even realise he was doing it, the genjutsu acted on its own and put us into a basic hypnotic state."

None of the genin knew what to say to that, and then Naruto started to laugh. Kurenai just shook her head at his antics.

"Now normally this would be where I give you your true gennin exam, but seeing as Naruto beat me to it, you all pass. Congratulations, you are all now official genin of Konoha. Meet me here tomorrow at 6:00am and we can start your training."

With that the three genin left and when they left Kurenai let out a deep breath before standing up and leaving to report to the Hokage. She never noticed that Naruto had come back to the training grounds.

Walking up to the tree he had seen earlier the blonde pulled a branch off and bit into it.

"Yuck! Tastes like wood!"

XXX

**Hope you like it, I know it's not really that different from the original, but like I said before I'm mostly jut improving what I already wrote. There will be a few changes, but not until later :)**

**R&R**


	3. The Customer is Always-POTATO!

**Here's the new chapter, let me know what you think. And thank you for all of the reviews. :)**

XXX

**Disclaimer- I own nothing **:(

XXX

Chapter 3: The Customer is Always-POTATO!

Kurenai was at her wits end, this was her team's fourth D-rank and Naruto was driving them all crazy. Their first mission had been to paint a civilian's house, it went ok at first but the problem came when the client's wife came home and saw Naruto. By the time her husband had calmed her down and took her into the house nobody noticed that Naruto had painted the house bright pink instead of the white the client had supplied them with, they still didn't know where he got the dam paint.

The second mission had been to weed an old ladies garden; this had gone fine until she refused to pay Naruto. While Kurenai had been arguing with her Naruto had replaced all her plants with cannabis and yet again, they still didn't know where he got the plants, though Kurenai was more worried at the thought of a high Naruto.

The third had been to catch tora, this had actually gone ok. Seems Naruto had a way with animals, he had been the first ever ninja to just walk up to Tora and pick him up without the cat going insane. The problem had come when he left with the little beast for a while. Nobody knew what he did but after the mission it became a lot harder to catch the cat when it escaped again. One gennin team had reported that they had seen him jumping through the trees like a ninja and another and claimed that the cat had shot a fireball at them.

This mission was simple, get the shopping for a woman that had broken her leg and bring it to her house. Everything was going fine, until she had given Naruto a dirty look. At the time the boy had just ignored her, but his team had got to know him over the past few weeks and knew he was going to do something. This was why Kurenai was watching him like a hawk.

They had just gotten back to the clients house without incident and were just waiting for their pay. When the client had been paying them she gave Naruto another dirty look and tried to give him half what she owed him, but after a few harsh words from the red eyed jonin she thought better of it and paid them in full. The feeling of dread that had increased when Naruto didn't say anything, just stood there grinning.

A few minuets later they had gotten the money and were on their way to report to the Hokage when they heard a scream from inside the house. Rushing back inside they had arrived to see the woman sitting on the floor, covered in bright red paint. It turns out that Naruto had somehow put paint bombs in her shopping bags when they weren't looking. Letting out a deep breath Kurenai and the other two gennin started to help her off the floor and to a chair in the living room, the whole time Naruto was laughing his head off, rolling around on the floor. It took them an hour to calm her down.

Now here they were stood in front of the Hokage in his office with Kurenai, Hinata and Shino looking like they had just finished running a marathon while Naruto just looked around the room with an innocent expression on his face as he whistled. For a full minuet Sarutobi said nothing, just sat there looking at Naruto with his pipe in hand.

"...I thought we talked about this Naruto, you can't keep attacking clients."

Naruto just stood there, giggling.

"Well...technically she wasn't a client when it went off; we already finished the mission at that point."

None of them knew what to say to this because he was right, they had finished the mission.

Sighing to himself, Sarutobi just waved a hand for them to leave.

"Whatever, I'm getting too old for this shit, just go."

With that they left to go to the training grounds.

XXX

Team eight had decided to hold off on missions for a while, at least until they were able to stop Naruto from being... well Naruto. It was a good goal, at least that's what they told themselves, but the problem was that it was impossible to predict what he would do. Every time they thought they had succeeded the blonde would come up with something new that they didn't expect. The only real advantage to this was that it did wonders for the team's ability to improvise and think on their feet, if they could deal with Naruto's craziness then nothing could faze them.

Kurenai, Hinata and Shino were currently waiting for Naruto at training ground 8. Today Kurenai was planning to teach Hinata and Shino how to water walk, she would have been teaching Naruto it as well but he was having...problems, with tree walking. The last time he attempted it he was blown off so hard he not only broke the tree he was trying to walk on, but three other trees as well when he flew into them and laded in the middle of the lake.

For some reason Naruto was always a few minuets late to team training, they had asked him about it several time but never got a straight answer, so after a while they just accepted it, he was never late to missions so it wasn't too big a problem. But after waiting for a few minutes longer they decided to start without him and it wasn't until half an hour later that Naruto walked into the training grounds, a strange bundle on his back.

This put them all on edge; though Naruto had never done anything to them they were still cautious.

When so he got to them and put the bundle down they approached with causation, their eyes shifting from the bundle on the ground to the blonde nervously.

"Hey guys, I got you something!"

Seeing their faces Naruto just laughed.

"Don't worry so much, their not going to explode...at least I don't think they will."

The thoughtful look on his face as he added that last part did not fill them with confidence and the three of them took a step back as he reached down and unfolding the package before he took a step back himself and looked at them all expectantly.

"Soooo...what do you think?"

They didn't really know what to think; on the ground before them were the most bizarre yet beautiful objects any of them had ever seen. The first one looked like a normal kunai knife. But when you looked closely you could see that it was a lot smaller and streamline then most and was attached to a small cylinder with leather straps by a length of ninja wire. The knife itself was also covered in strange markings that they soon realized were seals that had been carved perfectly into the metal.

The next were two long metal pipes about four feet in length, with a small needle like point. From a distance the surface of them looked unblemished, apart from the seals that had been carved into them, but on closer inspection they realized that they were both hollow and that there was a small hole in the end of each of them. They were attached to leather straps at the blunt ends.

The last was a pair of strange gloves made from white silk with silver seals actually stitched into them and went up to just below the elbow. The tips of the fingers were silver except for a small hole at the end no bigger then a pin.

After a while of staring at them Kurenai looked at Naruto with a mixture of shock and confusion.

"They are beautiful Naruto but where did you get them, and why did you bring them here?"

Naruto gave her one of his rare, sincere smiles when she asked that.

"Well... remember when I said that I was looking into weapon crafting...?"

Three sets of eyes widened at his words, switching from staring at the now identified weapons then back to the once again grinning blonde.

"You mean you _made_ these?"

"Yep, I made a deal with a smith in the village. I get to use his workshop and I let him look over some of my designs. Nice guy, open minded."

Naruto seemed to get lost in his own mind for a moment before he continued.

"Anyway, I brought them here because I made them for you guys. We've been a team for a while now and I've gotten a pretty good idea of your fighting stiles, so made you these to compliment them. For example..."

Bending down and picking up the kunai like weapon, Naruto took on an almost lecturing tone and started to explain the weapons.

"This is for you sensei, it goes on your arm under you sleeve. Now I know that when you cast a genjutsu you can't move from one spot without risking disrupting the flow of your of chakra. So I made you this. By channelling your chakra to the cylinder it will launch the kunai at about 90mph, give or take depending on how much chakra you, and if you then channel it through the wire to the blade at the end you can control it to a limited degree. It will take a lot of practise but when you master it you should be able to cast genjutsu and kill your enemies without having to rely on someone to make the finishing blow. The seals are mostly to make it more durable and help with the initial launch."

Kurenai was speechless so say the least; Naruto had made this just for her? It was without a doubt the perfect weapon for her style. He had made her the perfect weapon after only knowing her for less then two months. She was about to thank him but before she could say a word he moved onto the pipes.

"Now these are for Shino and, if they work out, your family. The pipes are made from a strong metal to compensate for them being hollow and the seals on the outside add to that. They can retract into smaller pipes so they can be hidden under your sleeves and by channelling chakra through them you can make them extend to their full size again. The main idea is that you can have some of your bugs hide inside the pipes and, when you stab someone, inject them into you opponent. I know that your clan can't fight in close combat without putting your hives at risk so these should help with that problem."

Shino was deeply impressed with the weapons and the idea itself, but guessed that he shouldn't be surprised; it would take someone with a mind like Naruto's to come up with something as unorthodox as this.

"And last but certainly not least, this is for Hinata and like the others I made it to go with your family's fighting style and in theory they should be able to enhance your gentle fist. By channelling chakra into the end of the fingers they can give your chakra sort of boost. If it works like I think it will, you will be able to actually destroy someone's chakra points completely with enough training. The metrical is light so it wont effect your speed, but the seals I stitched onto them make them almost as strong as the metal I used to make Kurenai-sensei's and Shino-san's, so as long as its not charged with chakra you could catch a sword with your bear hands and not get a scratch."

This actually shocked Hinata, her family had been trying to improve the gentle fist for years to the point that they could actually destroy a persons chakra points and here was Naruto, the most insane ninja anyone had ever known, solving what her entire clan couldn't after watching her train for a few weeks.

It was then that he explained the seals in a little more detail.

"Now as for the whole not sure it they will exploding thing, the seals are your basic strengthening seals like I said before, with something of my own thrown in. Chakra channelling seals, I made them to help you channel your chakra through the metal, or in Hinata's case fabric, so all you have to do is add chakra and the seals do the rest. The only thing is I haven't fully... what's the word, tested them yet."

This surprised Kurenai more then the actually weapons, she knew that he was looking into seals, but never thought he would come so far in so little time. to actually create your own seals, even simple ones, took a lot of knowledge.

"This is great Naruto, but why did you go to so much trouble?"

Naruto just looked at each of them for a moment before his grin came back, the serious atmosphere gone as quickly as it came.

"Why the hell not?"

When they had gotten up after face planting, each thanked him before asking if he had made anything for himself. His grin took on an unnerving glint and he reached behind his back and pulled out two wicked looking miniature scythes that had been hidden behind his long hair. The handles looked like they fitted his hands perfectly and were wrapped in thick black leather with red seals stitched into the folds. The blades themselves were stained a deep black that seemed like it didn't reflect any light and the edge was a deep, blood red with jagged teeth instead of being straight. They had the same seals as the other weapons etched into the metal, but they were almost impossible to see. The sight of them actually sent shivers down their spines, they seemed to radiate a terrible beauty that left no doubt that they were made to take life.

"These...are my scythes."

No one said anything for a few minuets, the blades seeming to weigh down the area with there own killing intent, which was promptly broken by Naruto falling over and laughing so hard it looked painful.

When she saw he had finally calmed down Kurenai spoke.

"Well thank you Naruto, these are all great but I think Hinata and Shino should finish the water walking exercises before learning how to use them. I'm sure the extra control will help in learning how to use them."

Shrugging his shoulders Naruto just put his scythes away and without another word ran to a tree at the edge of the training ground, only to fly pass them and into the water when he was blown off again. As they watched him get up and do the same thing over and over again, Shino summed up their thoughts perfectly.

"It's hard to tell if he is a genius or an idiot at times like this."

Nodding their heads in agreement they all turned back to the lake, their new weapons in place and started the excise again with new found enthusiasm, Naruto's laughter echoing around the clearing as he was continually blasted off the trees.

XXX

It had been a month since team 8 had gotten their weapons from Naruto and ever since then they couldn't be any closer. Hinata and Shino had finished water walking in record time, wanting to start training with their new weapons as soon as possible and Kurenai was starting to get the hang of her 'Straight Shooter' as Naruto had decided to call it. She still had some work to do, but she was getting there. He didn't name the Hinata's or Shino's, saying that they could do it themselves with their families.

Speaking of which, both the Hyuga and Aburame clans had been very impressed with the weapons, so much so that they had requested Naruto to make more for them and he had told them of a small ninja shop owned by a man named Higashi. It turned out this was the man Naruto had made the deal to use his workshop with. Naruto gave him the designs after he made them encase this happened, as long as he got 30% of the profits and that he tell nobody who made them, this applied to the clans as well, Higashi could remake and sell them.

When Kurenai asked why he didn't want anyone to know he made them she could have sworn he was channelling his inner Nara when he said.

"Too bloody troublesome."

It turns out this was more than sufficient, as the clans were paying a small fortune for the weapons. Higashi and his daughter were making so much money from Naruto's weapons they were thinking of expanding the shop.

The Hyuga's had named Hinata's weapon 'The Hands of Kami', as they believed their eyes were a gift from Kami herself and the Aburame had been a bit more modest and named theirs 'Wasp Point'.

Naruto, after many times of being shot off the trees like a cannonball, had finally got the hang of tree walking. He even managed to learn water walking, though the first time he tried all he did was push the water away from him, making a ten foot wide circle around him in the water.

Eventually team 8 started doing missions again, thankfully Naruto had not done anything to the clients, apparently word had gotten out and none dared to do anything to raise the boy's ire. They were currently stood in the Hokage office after just returning Tora to the daimyo's wife and he was looking at their mission record to decide if they were ready for a C-rank mission or not.

"Well...everything seems to be in order, I see no reason-"

Before he could finish the doors to the office slammed opened and Kiba stormed in, followed by the rest of team 7.

"Hey Hokage-sama, can we _please_ get a C-rank now. These D ranks are driving me and Akamaru crazy!"

The moment they saw team eight, or more importantly Naruto, they stopped in their tracks and Kakashi apologised for Kiba's rudeness, though no one but the Hokage noticed the way Kakashi's eye lingered on Naruto for a moment before moving to Kurenai.

"Sorry Kurenai-chan, hope we didn't disturb you."

Before the red eyed jonin could answer she was drowned out by Naruto.

"Duck ass! Dog piss! Pinkie! How you been!"

Everyone in the room sweat dropped at this except the three gennin, who were silently steaming at the names. When they had calmed down the Hokage spoke.

"... Well team 7 does have the necessary number of D ranks to take a C...how about this, I was just about to give team 8 here a C rank, what would you say to a joint mission?"

The two jonin looked at each other for a moment, weighing their options. It wasn't uncommon for genin teams to work together on occasion, and with the two of them together it would ensure their first time outside the village would be safer, so after a silent signal to each other they both nodded to the old Hokage.

"Very well, seeing as team 8 were here first Kurenai will be team leader. The mission is to protect a bridge builder named Tazuna while he travels to his home town in Wave country and until he finishes his bridge. The client will be here shortly."

No sooner had he said this then an old man walked into the room on unsteady feet with a pack on his shoulder, a grey beard. The moment he entered the room it was filled with the strong smell of sake. The moment his slightly unfocused eyes saw the six genin a frown crossed his face and he looked to the Hokage with an unimpressed expression on his red face.

"I pay good money for a ninja guard and you give me this? And what the hell is the mummy grinning at... eh?"

At these words four loud smacks were heard and after looking around the room team 7 saw the Hokage, Kurenai, Shino and Hinata with their hands on there faces. No one noticed as Naruto's grin took on a sinister edge.

XXX

Both team 8 and 7 were stood at the front gates of Konoha waiting for Tazuna to show up so they could leave. After what he said the day before the Hokage had quickly dismissed them and told them when to be here. The two teams were keeping their distance from each other, mostly because of a certain blonde genin that kept giggling and muttering to himself. Speaking of Naruto, both Kurenai and Kakashi were worried what he would do, his track record speaking for itself. They knew he wouldn't actually _kill_ Tazuna, but beyond that they didn't know what he would do.

They didn't have to wait long for the old bridge builder, right on time they could see Tazuna heading their way. He had the same clothes and smell as the day before, but at least he was able to walk in a straight line now. His eyes were red and he was clearly suffering from a monster hang over. As he approached Kurenai cast a nervous eye over to Naruto, but he was just stood there grinning at Tazuna as if nothing ever happened. Not breaking his stride the old man walked right past them and through the gate.

Nodding to their teams Kurenai and Kakashi followed after him.

They were about an hour away from the village when Naruto started to walk next to the old drunk. They spoke in low voices for a moment when Naruto pulled out a small silver flask, which he handed to Tazuna, who took the lid off and had taken a swig before anyone could stop him. Giving the flask back to the boy he stood there a moment, all eyes on him, then his eyes went wide and he opened his mouth, they could all see smoke coming out. It was shortly after this that all the strength left his legs and he fell over.

Bending down and lifting the old man onto his shoulder, laughing the whole time, Naruto started to continue on down the road as if nothing had happened.

Moving next to her student Kurenai walked next to him for several minutes before she couldn't hold her questions anymore.

"What the hell is in that flask Naruto?"

This caused Naruto to laugh louder.

"Don't worry; he'll wake up in about ten minuets. I gave him my home made hangover cure. Ha-ha, did you see the smoke?"

All the ninja present just sweat dropped at the insane boy's antics.

"Naruto if this is to get rid of his hangover then why in the name of Kami is he unconscious? What the hell is in that stuff?"

Turning around and walking backwards so he was facing them, Naruto got a thoughtful look on his face.

"Well let me think...a few herbs, some spices, wasabi, chilli powder, grey lizard intestines, cat piss... Oh! And some strange fish I found in the lake at our training grounds."

Again they all sweat dropped.

Luckily they were getting used to Naruto, well...as used to him as one could get anyway. They were actually surprised when exactly ten minuets later Tazuna's eyes shot open and, after jumping off the blondes shoulder, started to run around holding his throat. After being given water, he turned to Kurenai and asked in a dry voice.

"What the hell did I just fucking drink!"

Shaking her head, she patted the old man on the back and smiled.

"You don't want to know."

It was then that Naruto made his appearance.

"So drunk, how's the head?"

Turning to face the boy to yell at him, Tazuna stopped when he suddenly realized that his hangover _was_ gone. Without saying anything Tazuna started walking again, not looking at Naruto. As he passed Kakashi they could all here him mumbling about stupid mummies and not warning him about tastes.

XXX

That night they had decided to set up camp in a small clearing about thirty feet away from the footpath to avoid being noticed. Not much had happened since Naruto had so kindly...helped, Tazuna with his hangover, though the old drunk had refused to say anything to any of them since since.

It was shortly after they had finished setting up their tents that they noticed Naruto didn't set one up for himself and Sakura, being the ever curious person she was, took it upon herself to ask him where his tent was. The answer shocked them all and even got Tazuna's attention.

"Don't need one. My body produces so much raw chakra that it converts any I don't use into energy. I don't actually need to sleep more than an hour or so a week if I don't use any."

None of them knew what to say to this, to have so much chakra that you didn't need to sleep was unheard of.

"Erm...just how much chakra _do_ you have exactly?"

Thinking for a moment Naruto considered how best to answer.

"Well according to the old man... about thirteen times more then any Kage known to have ever lived. But I can't actually use most of it because I can't control it and most jutsu I try to use ends badly because I always overload them, I can only use jutsu with high chakra cost."

Even Tazuna was shocked at this, he might not be a ninja but even he knew not to mess with a Kage. They all sat in silence after that, staring into the smokeless fire as they thought about what they had learned about the strange blonde.

After a few more minuets of this, Naruto reached behind his back, pulled out his violin and without looking at any of the others in the clearing started to play. The music was soft and gentle...calm even, the complete opposite of the one playing it. Naruto's face took on a serene look as he played and it was almost like he wasn't an insane psychopath.

They all sat and listened to the boy play, watching the fire as it seemed to dance in the night along with the music. They were spellbound, none could move as they listened to the slightly haunting melody that came from the violin. But as the night went on they knew that they needed to go to sleep and, one by one they all got up and went to their tents to sleep, the sound of Naruto's violin the last thing they heard as they drifted off.

None of them saw the single tear that trailed down Naruto's face as he played into the night, his eyes fixed on the small fire in front of him.

XXX

The next day they had all woke up to the sight of Naruto leaning over a small pile of dead rabbits that he had just finished skinning and after he sealed away the skins they ate, packed up the camp and were on there way. The atmosphere was a lot calmer then the day before and the two teams were spread out in a loses formation as Sakura talked to Tazuna about Wave country.

It wasn't until about an hour later when the two jonnin noticed the puddle in the road ahead and the sight of it made Kurenai's blood boil. Such a poor attempt at a genjutsu. Looking at each other, the two jonin silently agreed to let the genin handle it and only step in if they needed to.

They didn't have to wait long; as soon as they past the puddle two men, wearing brown cloaks with masks covering the bottom of their faces, jumped out and wrapped a battle chain around both of them. The genin and Tazuna turned around just in time to see their sensei fall to the ground in bloody peaces.

"Two down..."

"...seven to go."

After saying this, the two ninja started to run toward them, chain at the ready and Team 7 froze, not knowing what to do without Kakashi. Luckily for them, team eight did.

Shino and Hinata were in front of Tazuna as soon as they saw what happened, Hinata with her Byakugan active and Shino with his hive spread out in the air around him. Naruto had moved to intercept the two shinobi, a huge grin on his face as he pulled out his scythes from behind his back and met the two head on. Before the two ninja had moved two meters towards them he was there.

With his back turned to the others they didn't see his grin turn predatory, his hair shadowing his eyes as he let out just enough killing intent to send a shiver down the back of anyone that looked at his face, but the demon brothers did and it stopped them in their tracks, eyes wide. This..._boy_...had the same grin as _him_.

They were brought out of there thoughts by the insane giggling that erupted in his throat and his words laced with killing intent.

"Let's have fun...don't die too quick."

That was all it took to anger the brothers, who did this kid think he was! Yelling in rage, the two ran straight at the boy, intending to wrap him in their chain, but before they could a kunai pinned it to a nearby tree.

As they struggled to get the chain free Naruto turned to Sasuke.

"Don't interfere with my fun! Do that again and I will rip out your eyes and shove them up your fucking ass!"

None of the genin knew what to say, they had never seen Naruto like this, his grin was still in place but his voice was hard. But it was more then that, when he turned to face the group they all saw his features taking on an almost demonic look. His teeth were longer, sharper and his eyes sank back into his head.

Turning back to his pray Naruto was just in time to see them detach the chain from there gauntlets and charge at him again. What followed was one of the most...odd, kinjutsu battles any of them had ever seen, including the two jonin hiding in the trees.

His grin stretching painfully large, Naruto switched the scythe in his left hand to a reverse grip...and started to spin as the two clocked ninja charged at him. He span so fast that all they could see of him as a yellow and black blur with just a hint of red from the edges of his scythes. Every time one of the brothers got within striking range they would be pushed back and before long they were on the defence as the blur that was Naruto started to move towards them and as his spins got faster and faster they had a harder time to block and dodge.

Small cuts started to appear all over their bodies and their clothes were soon torn to shreds, their movements started to get more and more sluggish as more and more cuts covered their bodies. No matter what they did it seemed to make no difference, none of their strikes came even close to him. Ten minuets into the fight and the demon brothers dropped to the ground, there entire bodies littered with small, paper cut like marks.

When he saw that they couldn't fight anymore Naruto stopped his rotations, he was a bit unsteady on his feet for a moment but quickly got over it and put his scythes away before tying them up with ninja wire.

Seeing that Naruto was finish the two thought dead jonin sensei stepped out of the woods and after explaining how they had gotten away with the **substitution **jutsu they turned to congratulate Naruto, only to see him positioning the two brothers in a way that they could see each other.

When they were about to ask him what he was doing he started to circle them slowly, before stopping in front of the one with two horns on his headband and speaking in an almost soft voice that sound wrong coming from his lips.

"Now, which one of you is the brain...you look like the man with the plan. So, are you going to tell me why you attacked us?"

The only answer he got was the man spitting on the ground at his feet.

Naruto's grin turned malicious and without saying a word he turned to the other brother. When he was within arm reach he spoke again.

"I was hoping you would say that."

Lifting his hand up for all to see he made his fingers change, turning into long black snake like creatures, there small mouths full of needle like teeth snapping at the man as he lowered them towards his face.

Seeing what the boy was planning Kurenai quickly cast a genjutsu on the gennin and Tazuna so they went blind, but she forgot to make them deaf.

Which meant they could all hear the man's muffled screams as Naruto lowered his hand to his head and the worms made their way into his mouth, nose and even under his skin. After a minute of the man squirming the two jonin watched in morbid fascination as his skin start to move as the snakes spread throughout his body under his skin.

Staring in horror at his younger brother the ninja could only watch as the lines moving under his skin seemed to go into a frenzy before, without warning, he stopped screaming and his entire body. The only thing that remained was his severed head as the rest of him exploded in a shower of blood, his face frozen in an expression of absolute terra.

Turning back to the now terrified ninja, Naruto slowly made his way over, his hand still changed into the snake-like creatures and an insane grin. And that was the last straw for the missing-nin.

"ALL RIGHT ALL RIGHT! I'LL TELL YOU ANYTHING YOU WANT! JUST KEEP THOSE THINGS AWAY FROM ME!"

For the next few minuets he told them everything he knew about Gato and Zabuza. Everything he knew he told them in a panicked voice, his eyes never leaving the snakes, and when he was done Naruto took out one of his scythes, walked up to him and without a word slit his throat in such a way that it took him several minuets to bleed to death. The moment the light left his eyes Naruto used his scythe to cut of the head completely. When he was done Naruto took a sealing scroll from his bag and sealed both the severed heads into it and after letting out a satisfied sigh the blood on his clothes and bandages seemed to melt into them and within minuets he was clean.

Kurenai and Kakashi just stared at blonde for a moment, not sure what to think. It was the first time either of them had seen Naruto's bloodline in action, and what it he could do with it scared them. Without a word Kakashi walked passed Naruto and did a quick fire jutsu to get rid of what was left of the bodies.

Kurenai waited until there was nothing left before she released her genjutsu on the two five genin and Tazuna and after a quick talk with the old bridge builder they decided to continue the mission.

XXX

For the next few hours before they set up camp for the night no one said a word. Every now and then they would sneak glances at the blonde when they thought he wasn't looking, but other then that they just travailed in complete silence. None of the genin knew exactly what Naruto had done, but they knew from the screams it was bad. Kiba could still smell the blood that clung to Naruto like a blanket, though he chose not to say anything.

Shortly after they finished setting their tents and built a smokeless fire Naruto left without saying a word. About an hour later he came back, hair wet and with a dead dear slung over his shoulder, the smell of blood still strong in the air but from the dear instead of him.

They all watched quietly as Naruto sat down on a near by rock, away from the fire, and started to skin and prepare the meat from the dear with a small knife he had taken from his bag. Every so often throwing a piece into the wood to unseen animals that had been attracted by the smell.

It was a clear night and the moon was almost completely full, casting an eerie glow on the insane boy as he did his work, humming to himself as he did. When he finished Naruto went on to stripping the bark off of several branches to cook the meat over the fire.

Not being able to stand the silence anymore Kiba spoke in a quiet voice, drawing the attention of all those present, Akamaru sleeping in his hood.

"What the hell did you do to them back there? They only had small cuts, why did they stop?"

Naruto, turning to face the dog like boy with his usual grin in place, giggled.

"Have you ever gotten a paper cut?"

Seeing the boy nod his head he continued.

"They hurt don't they? Something so small, yet they can hurt as much as a kunai to the gut. Imagine having your entire body covered in them, your face, your arms, your legs, even your torso... small cuts all over your body. What do you think would happen?"

It was Sasuke that answered first.

"It would start to slow you down, then the more cuts you get the more pain. You can't fight if you are too focused on the pain."

Turning his grin to the dark haired boy, Naruto nodded.

"Exactly...and when the pain gets too much your body stops on its own, leaving you completely vulnerable."

This time it was Kakashi to ask a question.

"Where did you learn that style? I've never heard of anyone fighting like you did, the spinning, the precise aim so you only broke the skin when you cut. It seems like the perfect style for capturing an opponent while causing the most amount of pain, while at the same time it could be turned into a full on offensive at a moments notice, capable of quickly overpowering anyone that doesn't know how to counter."

Naruto just nodded at the assessment of his style.

"That sounds about right. I'm still working a few bugs out of it, but that pretty much sums it up... and I didn't learn it, I made it."

This didn't surprise team 8 as much as the others, they had gotten used to Naruto and the way he seemed brilliant one minuet and an idiot the next.

Nothing more was said for a while after that. Team 7 were a bit confuse at Naruto's, somewhat, subdued attitude as he explained his style. In the short time they had known him he had never been this... calm. He still let out a giggle from time to time, but other then that he seemed almost...normal.

While they had been talking Naruto had put the meat on the sticks and started to cook them, the smell filling the camp in a matter of minutes and making all their mouths water. When they were done Naruto handed them out and sat back down on the rock from earlier away from the others and when he had finished his own meat he put the stick down and pulled out his violin again.

He had just started playing when Sasuke spoke.

"Can you teach me your style?"

Naruto didn't stop playing and for a moment Sasuke thought he didn't hear him, until he saw the blondes eyes fixed on him. Kakashi was about to tell Sasuke that he was being rude when he was stopped.

"Sure, why not. We'll need to get you something to use until I can get you something better suited for you, but I don't have a problem with it. Actually, I think I have something here you can use for now."

Putting down his violin and reaching into his bag, Naruto pulled out a small scroll. Unrolling and putting his hand on one of the seals, a moment later there was a puff of smoke and in his hands were two beautifully crafted swords. The blades were only two foot long, with seals carved onto their length from tip to handle with a slight curve at the tip. They had no guard and the handles were wrapped in a fine red silk. The sheaths were made out of wood that had been stained black. After giving them a quick inspection Naruto nodded to himself and through them over to Sasuke.

Catching the blade Sasuke's eyes widened at the skill shown in the making of them, the weight was perfectly balanced as his eyes traced the seals that had been etched into the blade with a calculating look before he turned back to Naruto when the boy started speaking again.

"They were one of the first things I made. The seals make the metal strong and the blade shape should work for you just fine until we can something better."

Sasuke just stared at the weapons in his lap for a long moment before looking up at Naruto. He nodded once and said two words that no one had heard him say for many years.

"Thank you."

Naruto just nodded back, picking up his violin, and started to play again. Just like the night before, they all fell asleep to the sound of Naruto's violin.

XXX

The next morning after they had finished the rabbits Naruto had caught and killed while they slept, the two jonnin sat the group down and explained about Zabuza. Needless to say, Naruto was the only one grinning at the end.

"S-so you're saying he's like a real a demon?"

Sakura voice was barely understandable because of the quiver in it. Turning to his student Kakashi with a understanding look in his single eye, let out a small sigh as ne nodded.

"...pretty much"

An air of depression started to leak out of the genin, the thought of having to face someone like Zabuza weighing heavily on all their shoulders. But the silence didn't last long.

"Potato!"

This caused them all to sweat drop and, turning to look at a grinning Naruto, Kurenai let out a breath and asked the question they were all thinking.

"Should I even bother to ask?"

"...Probably not"

Shaking there heads they returned to the conversation at hand, the tense atmosphere having been broken by the blondes random outburst.

"Anyway, as we were saying. When Zabuza shows himself you all stay with Tazuna while Kurenai and I fight him. You will not engage Zabuza, if something happens to us you run, understand."

"That's stupid."

They all turned their attention back to Naruto and, raising his one visible eyebrow, Kakashi motioned for him to explain.

"If this guy is as strong as you say then how can we outrun him if he kills both of you?"

That stopped both of the older ninja in their tracks, he had a point. After that they spent about an hour planning what to do if both jonin failed before continuing on their way to wave.

XXX

They had crossed the river about an hour ago and so far everything was going fine up to this point, at least no one had tried to kill them on the way across and for some reason Naruto had taken to walking on his hands instead of his feet shortly after they got off the boat.

Ever since the demon brothers attacked they had started to be a lot more formal in the way they guarded Tazuna, all of them keeping there senses on wide alert for any incoming attacks. Currently they were set up in a circle formation around him, Kurenai and Kakashi at the back, Naruto at the front and the others at the sides.

As they were getting closer to their destination Kurenai was getting more and more worried that they didn't get attacked yet so quickly moved to stand next to Naruto, leaving Kakashi to cover the rear for a moment.

"Naruto I think you should walk on your feet again, we could be attacked at any minute."

Pouting, the insane blonde did as he was told and started to walk normally again and not ten minutes later they found themselves in a thick mist that made it hard to see more than a few feet in any direction. It so bad that they were struggling to see each other. They knew instantly that it was Zabuza; Hinata could see the tiny particles of chakra mixed in with the mist.

All that they were waiting for was for him to make the first move.

The mist caused more problems then they expected though, not only did it make it hard to see, but according to Kurenai it made it almost impossible to cast her genjutsu, something about the chakra in the air interfering with her ability to use her chakra in the right way. This meant that when he did make his move, Kakashi was on his own.

They continued on their way, pretending that they weren't waiting for an attack, and after only being in the mist for a few minutes Kakashi heard it, the sound of something moving though he air at high speeds. Quickly grabbing Tazuna the one eyed jonin had just enough time to warn the others.

"GET DOWN!"

Instantly they all hit the floor, heads down...except Naruto, who had jumped up instead and as he was coming back down instead of landing on the ground he found himself spinning through the air at high speeds on a giant sword, using his chakra to keep him in place.

"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!"

Eventually he stopped when it struck a tree and got stuck.

"That was so fun! Can I go again!"

Getting off the sword he wobbled for a moment as his head was still spinning, but before he cold regain his balance Naruto was kicked hard in the back towards his team.

"Hey! That wasn't nice!"

"Tell someone who gives a fuck!"

Turning to look at the man that had kicked him Naruto's eyes locked on the huge form of Momochi Zabuza. He wire a light grey sleeveless shirt, black and grey cameo pants and grey arm warmers with his slashed head band slightly tilted to one side in a way similar to Kakashi's but without cover his eye. The bottom part of his face was completely covered by white bandages, preventing anyone from seeing his mouth and making his words slightly muffled. But Naruto only saw one thing and decided to comment on it, loudly.

"Dude! What happened to your eyebrows?"

Even with the current situation all those in the area face planted in the ground, including the Zabuza. When the missing-nin picked himself up he had a large tic mark on his forehead as he glared at the blonde.

"WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST SAY YOU MUMMY!"

"Your one to talk!"

The two stared at each other for a moment, smoke practically coming out of their ears as they glared, then without warning both burst out laughing. None of the others knew what to make of it, one minuet they were at each others throats and the next they were laughing together as if they were old friends. It goes without saying that they were all getting very worried.

When they had both calmed down Zabuza wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, still chuckling.

"You're all right brat, for a genin I mean, but I've got a job to do. Hand over the old man and you can all walk away."

For a moment the grin on the blondes face was replaced by a small smirk, his bright blue eyes seeming to shine.

"No can do, no brow."

Silently nodding his head at the boy Zabuza turned to Kakashi, his face serious once again as if nothing had happened.

"So are we going to do this? Or do you want to trade insults for a bit first."

Taking out a kunai and lifting his head band, Kakashi just stared at the missing-nin with a blank expression on his face, the three black dots in his now uncovered red eye spinning slowly. Without saying anything else the two met in a clash of steel, Kakashi with his kunai and Zabuza with his zanbato.

Kakashi put up a good fight, even though he was only using a kunai to defend himself from the larger mans huge sword he was still able to match him move for move, but it wasn't long before Zabuza gained the advantage. Sending Kakashi into a nearby lake that none of them had seen through the mist the Demon of the Bloody Mist had him trapped in a sphere of water before he could even resurface. When he has sure that the silver haired jonin was truly captured Zabuza quickly used his free hand to make twenty water clones and had them charge the group.

Thinking quickly, Kurenai run forward so that the real Zabuza would be in range and with a burst sent her Sharp Shooter straight toward him at high speed, hoping to take advantage of the fact he wouldn't be able to doge without releasing Kakashi in the process.

Unfortunately without using her genjutsu to help supplement the move it was easy for the experienced missing-nin to grab the blade and pull her into the water and before she knew it, Kurenai was in the same predicament as Kakashi, as another clone appeared on top of the water next to her used the same jutsu as the original to trap her in a sphere of swirling water.

At a silent command from their creator, the clones went speeding towards the gennin and bridge builder, swords raised high in preparation to cleave the group in half. But this time, unlike with the demon brothers none of them froze, Naruto and Sasuke ran to meet the clones before they could get to the others while the gennin stayed to protect Tazuna. Pulling his scythes from behind his back Naruto met the clones and started to spin while Sasuke, not having the chance to use the swords fixed to his back yet, chose to use a kunai in each hand.

As he watched the two boys finish off his clones Zabuza sent a curious look at the blonde. He could tell there was something different about him, the way he move, the way he spoke, if he was honest with himself he reminded him of himself when he was younger. Then it hit him, the brat was almost exactly like him when he was younger.

"I've got to say, I didn't think you Konoha wimps had it in you."

He could just hear Kakashi's reply though the water.

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't bullshit me Kakashi; I know what it looks like when someone has had their mind broken. That kid has the same look in his eyes that I did at his age. The skills, the attitude, even the grin. You people have the makings of a true monster in that boy."

He got no answer to this, which made him laugh. But what he didn't realize was that he was so caught up in his conversation with Kakashi that he didn't see Naruto spin his way over to him and his captive and, just before one of the scythes slit his stomach open, Zabuza was forced to jump back from the young psychopath. As soon as the jutsu was released Kakashi sent a kunai at the clone that held Kurenai destroying it in one shot, before turning back to the real one to resume their fight. Before the two could start again Kurenai grabbed Naruto by the hood on the back of his straight jacket and jumped back to the group on land, putting as much distance between them as she could.

The fight didn't last long after that, both ninja sent a water dragon at each other, Kakashi's overpowered Zabuza's and he was sent flying into a tree not twenty feet from where they were standing. Slowly making his way to the downed missing-nin with his kunai in hand, the silver haired jonin prepared to make the finishing blow.

He never got the chance.

Before he could finish what he started three senbon were seen sticking out of the missing-nin's neck and his eyes widened before going blank. Putting the kunai away Kakashi stepped to the body and checked for a pulse and when he found none, turned his head to a random tree to his right.

"Thank you for the assistance hunter-san, though you could have intervened a little earlier."

Before anyone could ask who he was talking to a masked ninja jumped out of the tree and, moving towards the body bent down to do their own pulse check. They had on a sae blue battle kimono, with their long brown hair tied up in a bun with senbon to hold it in place. The kimono hid most of their figure, making it impossible to identify them as a boy or girl, but even with the mask covering their face it was clear to all that the hunter-nin was young, no older then the genin themselves in fact. The mask was mostly blank, except for the eye holes, the Kiri sign on the forehead and a blood red wave like pattern on the right side. Nobody noticed the grin on Naruto's face stretch wider as the hunter passed him, his nostrils flaring for a moment as he took in the figures sent.

Nodding at Kakashi the hunter bent down to pick up the body and, without saying a word, disappeared in a swirl of water. The moment he was sure they were gone the once silver haired jonin pulled down his forehead protector to cover his eye and turned to the group with his customary eye smile in place.

"Well done you guys, great team work, and thanks Naruto you saved my life. Now, if one of you could carry me the rest of the way to Tazuna's house, I'm going to sleep for a bit."

And with that Kakashi eye rolled into the back of his head and he fell to the ground, unconscious.

Running over and checking her fellow jonin for any injury, Kurenai let out a deep breath before turning to the others.

"It's all right; he's just suffering from chakra exhaustion. A few days rest and he will be fine."

Before anyone could say anything more, Naruto walked up, grabbed Kakashi by his left leg and before they could ask what he was doing the blonde started to drag the downed jonin the way they had been going before Zabuza attacked, not even bothering to avoid the many stones in the road as he walked. When he was a few meters away he turned back to the group to se they hadn't moved and were just stood their staring at him.

"What?"

XXX

About an hour later they arrived at Tazuna's house, Kakashi was being carried by Sasuke and Kiba, who had taken him off Naruto who had wanted to just drag him the whole way there. They were all sat around the silver haired jonin, who had been put in a spare room in Tazuna's house and had regained consciousness a few minuets earlier. He had just finished telling them about how his eye used a lot of chakra, which was why he had chakra exhaustion.

"At least now that Zabuza is out of the picture, I doubt we will have anymore ninja... to worry...about... Naruto, is there a reason you're laughing like that?"

Part way through his talk Naruto had started to role around on the floor, banging his hands on the floor and holding his side as he laughed.

"Hahaha...you...ha...you actually believe... hahaha...that no-brows is dead... hahaha!"

His reaction confused the others in the room and when Naruto finally had calmed down Kakashi asked him what he meant, but all he said was...

"That wasn't a hunter-nin."

Both Kakashi and Kurenai's faces took a look of confusion, which quickly replaced with shock as something clicked in to place and Kurenai slapped a hand to her face and Kakashi muttered to himself.

"Shit, how could we have missed that?"

Turning to the still confused genin Kurenai explained.

"Hunter-nin's are required to remove the head and destroy the body of any missing-nin's they kill, with no exceptions outside of a battle field to insure the body doesn't fall into enemy hands."

Nodding his head Kakashi continued.

"But the one that took Zabuza's body didn't, they took him away. We can only assume that they were working together and the fake hunter put him into a near death state with the three senbon in his neck. This means they will be back."

The gennin got scared looks on their faces at his words, the thought of having to fight not one, but two missing-nin of their calibre was scary.

Turing to address her student, who was sat on the floor and had started to pick his nose with his big toe while they were talking and, after getting his attention, asked something that had been on her mind for the last few minutes.

"Naruto, if you knew about the hunter why didn't you say anything before now?"

Taking his toe away from his face as he raised an eyebrow at the red eyed women, the blonde sat up straight and shrugged.

"You still couldn't use your genjutsu, Cyclops over there was dead on his feet and the rest of us are genin. Why do you _think_ I didn't say anything?"

Nodding his head at the logic, Kakashi moved on.

"Fair enough, now we need to discuss what we are going to do. From the injuries he gained during our fight and the stress from being put into a near death state, Zabuza should be out of commission for about a month. Tazuna, how long will it take for you to finish your bridge?"

Thinking on it for a moment, the old man sighed.

"A little over a month, and that's only if we can keep on at the pace we have up to this point."

Nodding his head, Kakashi went on.

"Right, which means we are almost guaranteed to run into him again. We have a month. It's not much, but it's something."

Nodding her head, Kurenai sat on the bed next to her fellow jonin and looked at the sixe genin in front of her.

"From now until then we will be taking shifts, two of you will be training with Kakashi, two will be guarding Tazuna at the bridge with me and the other two will be guarding Tazuna's family encase anything happens. We can switch every two days."

They all nodded their heads at this.

"Potato!"

Again they all stared at Naruto, who just shrugged. Shaking his head at the strange blonde, Tazuna turned to look at the group with tears in the coroner of his eyes.

"I just want to thank you for all your doing for us, if it wasn't for you I would never have made it this far."

Naruto just laughed.

"Don't worry about it you old drunk, if we didn't help you then we wouldn't be any better than Gato."

Everyone in the room nodded at this, agreeing with the crazy genin.

XXX

They were all sat around a table in Tazuna's house with his daughter Tsunami, and her son Inari. Tsunami was a beautiful young woman in her late twenties with shoulder length black hair and a gentle smile that seemed to project warmth. Inari on the other hand had an air of defeat surrounding him and had on a plain white shirt underneath a set of green overalls and a white hat with blue stripes on his head covering his brown hair brown and his skin was very pale, obviously he didn't spend much time outside.

No one said anything as they eat the small meal, feeling a little bad that they were eating so much of the family's food when they had so little and as soon as he finished, Inari ran upstairs to his room without saying a word to his mother.

Turning to the ninja with a sad look on her face, Tsunami apologized to them all.

"Sorry about him, he was never able to get over Kaiza's death."

Seeing the questioning looks on their faces, Tazuna explained about how Kaizar had opposed Gato and had been publicly executed. It was a sad story and it got to all of them, even if they didn't all show it.

After a few minuets of silence Naruto stood and, without looking at any of them or saying anything, went to the front door. Just as the door was closing Kurenai spoke.

"Naruto where are you going?"

He didn't turn to face them, just looked over his shoulder with his usual grin on his face.

"...the roof."

Without saying anything else he left and a few minutes later they all heard it, Naruto's violin. Like all the other times they heard him play it was a soft, sad melody that filled the air around them with its soft embrace. Tsunami was to put it simply shocked, this being the first time she had herd the young boy play. It was a beautiful sound, but it didn't seem right to her for someone that hadn't stopped smiling since he had got there to play it.

"Why does he play such sad music, he seems like such a happy boy."

All the other people in the room stared at her for a moment before, wondering if she had hit her head or something, before Kiba summed up all heir thoughts.

"Happy, he's fucking insane!"

They all nodded there heads at this, making the dark haired women frown at them.

"That's not a nice thing to say about someone."

Shino took it upon himself to explain what they meant.

"I'm sorry Miss Tsunami, but I think you misunderstood. We weren't insulting him, Naruto is actually insane and has spent the last five years in a mental institution. He was released a few months ago to become a ninja."

Both Tsunami and Tazuna were shocked to hear this. But it was Tazuna that asked the next question.

"If he is insane then why the hell is he a ninja?"

Both jonin shared a look at each other before Kurenai sighed.

"There are certain things that we are not at liberty to saying, I'm afraid this is one of them."

With that said they all just sat there for a while, not saying anything else as they listened as Naruto continued to play.

And just like every night since they started this mission, he was still playing when they all went to bed.

XXX

**Let me know what you think. :)**

**R&R**


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